For Their Own Good
by kitsune13
Summary: a one-shot collection - Cloud and Tifa *fluff warning*. Chpt. 50 - she's always wanted to understand him better. THIS however may be just a bit too much. A tandem story with Ves and the confusing consequences of fighting new monsters for the first time. Original game setting.
1. Chapter 1

_Let me just preface this by saying this is going to be my dump box. That's right, my drabble collection (I suppose every author has to do one of these at some point). Whenever I get that burr that says something small needs to be written I'm just going to dump it in here. So this won't be a continuing story but rather a collection of small one shots that grows as the lighting strikes me, my cache for all the shorts that don't need to be stand alones. At least that's the plan, we'll see how it goes. I expect it will grow in fits and spurts. And hey -** finally** wrote something from Cloud's POV!! It takes place in a 'what if?' moment during the game - insert it wherever it seems to fit in the time line. I always loved his odd sense of humor in the game and was glad to see its reappearance in Dirge of Cerberus. I think its leaked out a bit here. AC Cloud and the game version of Cloud always seemed a bit different personality-wise to me too so that's going to show in this first short as well. Reviews are precious so don't forget to leave them. They're very motivational, especially the detailed kind. Yum!  
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**Trust**

by TamLin

Filthy. Everything seemed so filthy to him. He realized he shouldn't even notice, much less care. He was hardly clean himself by any stretch of the imagination, his own clothing dusty and marked with sweat and dried blood. They were all like that, tired out and worn down and dirty. And yet, somehow, walking into the little town, all he could think of was how much worse off then them it looked. Filthy and beaten down and ugly.

"Hopeless." The young woman walking next to him whispered it, tired enough that she was letting her thoughts slip out verbally. She did that when she was tired and it sparked something warm in his chest to realize that she'd always done that. That he actually remembered that about her.

He _remembered_…

It shouldn't have meant anything, but to him, it meant everything. It made his chest feel suddenly a little bit lighter despite the exhaustion and the ugly, _hopeless_ surroundings. He had remembered something that was entirely his own memory. Behind them their last team member grumbled.

"Probably got shit for food here." The big man sighed. "An' I'll eat it too, I'm so hungry."

They were all tired. They'd been fighting monsters and walking and sleeping out in the grass for days now and anything looked good. The thought of an actual mattress under his back, no matter how lumpy, almost made Cloud groan in anticipation. He was their leader though, even if he sometimes wondered why they still followed him so faithfully considering some of the things he'd done, and it was his job to look after his team. Even, and maybe especially, when it was an abbreviated team like this one was.

He'd failed a lot lately and yet somehow it was the small failures that bothered him the most. The failures that the rest of his team looked at him with trusting eyes and shrugged off. The times he didn't manage to take care of _them_. He'd started this journey without meaning to and for a long time hatred and revenge had been his muddled reason for it. He'd even entertained the comforting impression that he was doing this to save the planet itself for a while because that was an awfully noble reason and what better reason could he have? Except, it wasn't enough because it was too big and impersonal and somewhere along the way after his dip in the Lifestream and the fact they'd all stayed with him anyway and even, insane as it made all of them, still followed his lead – somewhere along the way he'd realized…

He was doing this for them. Because he couldn't stand the thought of letting them down. Again. Because, something inside him had to keep them safe and make them happy and keep them from falling. _They_ – his little ragtag team of misfits and awkward individuals and flat out certifiable nutcases… they were the reason he kept pushing himself onward toward the inevitable end. Because of them he wanted the sun to rise tomorrow and he wanted that hateful new red moon out of the sky and he wanted…

He wanted to keep them safe…

It was big talk from someone that wasn't even sure he wouldn't go off the deep end the next time he ran into Sephiroth and turn into a puppet again…

"Come on," he turned their weary steps toward what he hoped was an inn. It was the largest building in the area and seemed to have a lot of plastic coated windows. It sagged in the middle and the edges of the building were worn down and discolored. Hopeless, she'd called it and he realized it was that, not the dirt and careworn aspects, that made the place so ugly to him. It didn't matter. They just needed beds and hopefully some hot food. Just for the night and then they'd be on their way again.

The innkeeper looked apathetic when Cloud pushed his way in the creaking door and Cloud couldn't find the energy in him to respond with anything but the same. Ugly town, ugly man, ugly building… he wouldn't care if the beds were ugly though. He would be checking to make sure the lock on the door was sturdy however… until he remembered that the windows were all stapled down sheets of plastic and almost laughed at himself.

"Three beds, one room. Where can we eat?"

"Two beds," the key got pushed across the counter top to him without much care. "Boarding house across the road has food. Pay up front."

Cloud took the key and frowned to himself. Two beds. Everywhere they'd gone had three. Two beds was going to make it… awkward. Maybe he should get a second room…

The door pushed open and Cloud could feel who it was so he didn't turn as he counted out gil. The way the man at the counter suddenly sat up however made him tuck his chin to hide the smile. She had that effect on men. Even tired and covered in mud and monster blood with her hair tangled and loose around her shoulders, Tifa Lockhart was enough to make any man's breath catch in his chest. She did it to Cloud all the time and didn't even know it.

He laid the gil on the counter and decided to talk things over with the other two before he got another room. None of them said it but they'd gotten used to sleeping near each other and it was actually disturbing not to hear that soft noise and feel those presences in the dark. He supposed if it came down to it, he'd take the lonely room. He just hoped one of the other two of his team thought of a better solution first. He didn't like being alone at night when there was only silence, the voices in his head, and his tangled thoughts to keep him company.

Tifa was standing with her arms lightly hugging herself in the doorway, watching him when he turned and he gave her a little smile. She looked as if she was going to fall over right there. What he wouldn't do to find her a nice hot bath in a clean tub somewhere private. She'd like that. She didn't complain and she was just as tough as any of the men on the team – tougher than some in fact if you counted Cid and the way he fell asleep like a narcoleptic and couldn't do anything without a cup of tea nearby - but he didn't want her to have to be. She smiled back at him and it was one of her warm smiles that softened her face and made her eyes go warm and wine tinted. He liked to think that she only smiled that way for him because he'd watched and hadn't seen her give it to anyone else, but he wasn't sure if he was just being stupid. He'd been stupid a lot lately and he didn't want to mess things up anymore by still being that way. He cupped a hand under her elbow and guided her back outside. He was allowed to touch her that way and it still surprised him. After the Lifestream… he was allowed to touch Tifa Lockhart because they were friends, close friends. Maybe even, if he could manage it without sounding like a needy idiot… best friends. It was still a concept he was getting used to… touching people. He hadn't before, not if he could help it, and he was still having a problem with it now. It was just… easier to touch Tifa than anyone else. It always had been. She was the closest one to his soul and he wondered, sometimes at night while he sat watch over her as she slept, what exactly had happened in the Lifestream. He wondered… if she'd lost a piece of her soul inside him somehow. Considering all the other voices and personalities he had inside him… he didn't think it would be so terrible if there was a little part of Tifa there as well. Maybe that was why all the other noises in his head had been quieter since the Lifestream. Maybe she brought them peace the way she always did to him.

Barrett was waiting for them under the awning of the inn and beyond that it had started to drizzle. Cloud sighed silently. Instead of being misted and water colored the way rain usually managed, the town somehow looked even more bedraggled and beaten down. The packed earth of the main track through town was turning to bland colored mud and the air was starting to feel sticky and chilled.

"Food's across the way," Cloud gestured with his chin and remembered to let go of Tifa's elbow now that they were standing still again. Barrett just shook his head, not even having the energy to curse, and without a word the three of them darted across the street, mud splashing up to stick to their shoes and lower legs before they reached the dimly lit interior of the next building.

If outside was chilly, inside was stuffy and overly warm. Cloud sometimes wished his nose wasn't as good as it was because he could pick up the smells of old vomit, dried blood, and overly greasy food past the almost overwhelming scent of unwashed bodies and trapped smoke. His eyes adjusted better to dim light though and so he slid a hand under Tifa's elbow again and guided them toward the back of the crowded room. He always took a table with a back to the wall and in a corner if possible. It wasn't a habit he saw any reason to stop.

Tifa was drawing looks even though she had her head down and was barely managing to follow Cloud without stumbling. Cloud kept her well clear of the more aggressive looking tables. She was perfectly capable of breaking the arm of anyone that tried to grope her but so were he and Barrett and he thought he and Barrett would probably be the first ones to act on the desire too. With a nudge, he had her slide into the booth first and then took the protective spot on the outside of the bench, propping his giant sword against the wall within easy reach. Barrett slid in across from them and glowered around the room. Cloud didn't but he had still taken it all in and he'd noticed there were very few women in it. The ones that were…

Tifa leaned against the wall with a sigh and shut her eyes, tucking her legs up on the bench under her only the way a very flexible woman with amazingly long legs could and Cloud looked away from the contrasting pale of her skin with the dun colored mud that had splashed on it and concentrated on finding a harried waitress.

The sooner they all got some sleep the better.

"Don' like this," Barrett rumbled after they'd gotten drinks planted in front of them and the waitress had flounced off to get their food. Cloud knew she had been flirting with him because that's how they made their tips but he'd been too tired to want to deal with it. Next to him, eyes still closed, Tifa had an amused little smile on her face which was as loud as if she'd had the energy to tease him. She was the only one in the group that teased him. Cloud didn't like being teased but she had a way of doing it so gently and affectionately that, somehow, it was okay when Tifa did it. Sometimes, he even found himself enjoying it. It made him want to tease her back but he didn't know how and he thought if he did it wrong he might break the strange new closeness he felt between them. They'd been close before but since the Lifestream…

"What?" Cloud pulled his tired thoughts out of their comforting loop and looked at the large man across from him.

"I don' like this," Barrett repeated, shifting his gun arm restlessly. "Place's got the feel of too many people tucked too close. Makes for bad feelings real fast."

Cloud blinked at Barrett. He would never, on his most delirious, multiple-personality day, accuse the big man of being insightful. However, if a man that had lived in the Midgar slums thought the situation was crowded and unstable because of it, Cloud paid attention. His blue eyes lifted and scanned the room again and he had more people flinching back from their unnatural brightness than those that hadn't been looking in the first place. He was used to their drawing attention but this was more attention than usual. It woke him up from the stupor he'd been sliding into and he met Barrett's eyes over the table.

"We'll eat fast and go. We're all staying together tonight."

The dark man nodded and his eyes slid to Tifa who had all but fallen asleep tucked in the corner. Cloud watched his scarred face soften and resisted the urge to smile himself. You knew someone was special if they could turn Barrett into mush without even doing anything other than existing. He'd wondered about their relationship at first. The closeness had annoyed him and between that and Barrett's strong personality, Cloud had found himself going out of his way to annoy the other man. He hadn't seemed to have been able to help himself. During the journey though he'd come to respect and even like the other man and he got how Barrett felt about Tifa. It wasn't romantic.

The food came and Cloud wondered if the waitress had spit in it. Looking down at the unappetizing mess, he didn't think it would have made any difference if she did.

"Teef," he reached out to give her a gentle nudge and his hand fell on the curve of her bare calf before he realized it. She made a groggy, humming noise and didn't seem to notice his slip or the way he snatched his hand back to keep from offending her. It had been his gloved hand and so skin hadn't touched skin but…

But his palm on that hand still tingled maddeningly and he frowned down at his plate.

He was her friend. She had enough men that thought of her in other ways. He never wanted her to think he was the same way and lose that beautiful, vulnerable openness that was always in her eyes when she looked at him.

She shifted next to him and let out a quiet sigh as she looked down at the food in front of her and he knew she was lamenting the lack of a stove. He'd realized that she actually liked to cook and even more than that, she liked to cook for other people. It made her feel good and, since she was so good at it, Cloud supported the idea entirely. Especially when she was cooking for him. It was always delicious but more… there was something… personal about it. It felt… warm every time she set a plate or bowl down in front of him and he knew, without a single doubt in his mind, that she'd made it specifically for him. Just because she wanted to do it. For him.

She didn't complain as she ate now though and Cloud made it a point to inhale his own food. Her arm touched his companionably from time to time as she delicately spooned the mix into her mouth and that felt warm too. Barrett made another rumbling noise before they could settle too deeply into their food though.

"Gonna be problems gettin' otta here."

Cloud lifted his head but he hadn't been entirely unaware of the situation either. He could feel the familiar tickle between his shoulder blades. He exhaled in mild annoyance and looked. Sure enough, the tables between them and the door were watching their group and again, his narrow blue eyes made them flinch away. Usually the giant sword was deterrent enough but apparently this wasn't going to be one of those nights. With a male's natural instincts, Cloud knew the men weren't interested in him and Barrett. Most times, people were content to look and not touch and, as much as he didn't like that either, Cloud had learned to put up with it. Most of the time. Now wasn't one of those times apparently, though the group by the door were still trying to work up their nerve with liberal amounts of 'liquid courage'.

"Isn't there a back door we can go out?" Tifa asked, sounding more tired than annoyed and it told Cloud just how worn out she really was. Usually she was just annoyed. While Tifa was usually right there when it came to a fight, when it was over her she seemed to almost feel guilty and she tended to do everything, or almost everything, in her power to keep them from happening. It didn't help that she was in her barmaid's outfit but clothes shopping hadn't been a high priority and they hadn't exactly had time to pack before the Plate had fallen over Sector Seven.

There was no way she could wear the kind of clothes they'd been selling at the Gold Saucer the one time they'd actually had free time to relax. Costa del Sol had been even worse and Cloud's eyes automatically narrowed at their edges as he tried not to think of bathing suits and the woman he called his friend who happened to be sitting right next to him in the same mental picture.

"Only way out is through," he managed to keep up with the conversation at least and raised his eyes again. The men at the other table were still avoiding his gaze but they were getting slower at it.

"That's the way these places are," Barrett grunted, shoveling down his food. "Lots of hard men, not enough women to remind them to be civil. An' we've got a fine lady with us. They know she's not what they're used to but they don't know how else to act. Forgotten."

At Cloud's dry look, he shrugged.

"Corel wasn't always full of families. My pa brought my ma there an' she was one of the first ladies. She had to bang a few heads together until they learned to respect the woman."

Since, when he thought of the unknown 'Barrett's mom' all that sprang to Cloud's mind was the image of Barrett in a gingham dress and bonnet, it made the edges of Cloud's mouth twitch upward a little. He got the idea though.

Barrett gestured with his spoon apologetically to Tifa.

"It's cause you ain't with a man actual. So they think you're fair game."

Tifa made a noise and rubbed her hands over her face.

"Some days I hate men," she muttered and both of the men at the table with her shrugged in tandem, not taking it personally. Traveling with Tifa and Aerith had taught Cloud more about women and the way men reacted to them then his previous sixteen years put together. It had also taught him more about women themselves than he was sure he was comfortable ever knowing but that was part of living in close quarters with women that liked to talk girl talk even when the men were present. Tifa lowered her hands and exhaled.

"Can I just pretend to be with a guy? Will that make them stop?"

Barrett frowned and rubbed his chin as he looked at Cloud. Who looked blankly back at him for a full minute before he realized where the other man was going and his mako-blue eyes popped fully open. Any trace of tiredness was swept out of him.

"Don't think Spiky's aggressive enough to make them notice," he decided and Cloud felt Tifa wince next to him. He could sense her mentally backpedaling what she'd been too tired to realize she was stepping into even before she raised her hands, palms outward in front of her.

"I didn't mean – I mean – but – not like," her cheeks were adorably pink and Cloud realized just how cute it made her look at the same time he felt a strange burst of annoyance at Barrett. He shot the other man a narrow look. Barrett raised his own hand in defense.

"What? I'm just sayin' you're too laid back, Spiky. Men here, they're not good with subtle. You'd have to toss Tifa over your shoulder before they'd get the clue."

For some reason it just annoyed Cloud more and he felt a strange flare of anger. Then he heard Tifa stifle a giggle and turned hurt eyes on her to see she'd covered her mouth with her fingers and her eyes were shining. Seeing his look, she shook her head even though her eyes were still bright.

"No! Not – oh, Cloud!" she still had laughter in her voice and it stole his anger away from him the way her smile always stole his darker emotions away from him. "It's just – I'm sorry. It was the picture of you tossing a girl over your shoulder." Another stifled laugh escaped her and he found himself barely smiling as well.

"You don't think I'm caveman enough?" he asked and had the pleasure of watching his first attempt at teasing make her beautiful eyes go wide in shock before they wrinkled at their corners and bowed at their bottom.

"Cloud," she quietly laughed his name in delight and somehow that made it easier to reach out and wrap his arms around her to pull her in against his side. For her own good, he told himself and her eyes were so huge as they flew to his face that it made him feel strangely smug.

"Cloud – " her voice came out much differently this time, small and soft and confused and the smirk slid across his lips before he realized it. He'd never realized how adorable she looked when she was off balance and his long abused male ego felt a surge of pride to know that he'd been the one to put that look on her face. Adorable and still absolutely unguarded toward him. It soothed his worried heart.

"I can be a good boyfriend," he told her and told himself that he was talking about pretending and not actually being one as he cupped her cheek with his palm. She was so warm and soft against his side – he needed to touch her. She didn't pull away from him or stiffen and her eyes, still helpless and vulnerable didn't leave his. He watched the very edges of her lips tremble and found he didn't want to look away from her lips.

"Oh?" she managed weakly. Still, barely, teasing him and that friendly, gentle affection helped him work up the nerve to nod.

"I can," he promised, voice gruffer than he'd meant it to come out. Was she lifting her chin? Just a little? We're just pretending, he reminded himself. So…

its okay?

His eyes met hers and that rich, dark color swallowed him whole. So… familiar. As if it were his home and he'd been away forever and yet it had always been there… waiting for him to return. He'd thought – no, he knew he'd felt something for Aerith. She'd been playful and laughing and drawn him out of the shell he wore around himself. She'd made him happy and he hadn't questioned himself so much around her. She'd been too full of life for him to think about himself and he'd been glad. He'd liked that.

Tifa made him question everything about himself and yet, disappearing into her eyes, he felt as if, whatever answers he ended up with, it would be all right. He felt as if, no matter how far he wandered, she'd be there when he came back and he'd still see his home in the depths of her eyes. She made him laugh too… but sometimes she made him want to cry. And scream. And howl. And finally, really, for the first time in his life, relax. Aerith had made him feel brave. Tifa made him feel strong and weak, scared and capable all at the same time. It was… complex. And familiar and necessary too. Her eyes were still watching him and he saw the uncertainty starting to move into them. In a second she'd pull away with a shy laugh and make a joke and scoot carefully back to her corner of the bench… and spend the rest of the night watching him from the corners of her eyes and looking sad behind her smile…

"Mm." He answered her question a second time and lowered his head. His lips found hers and brushed them lightly. He'd never kissed anyone that way before but it seemed necessary to kiss Tifa before he drowned in the sudden realization that all he could smell at the moment was her and whatever soft smelling kind of soap she used that always seemed to linger on her skin.

"I can," he repeated against the softness of her mouth and her lips barely parted to let a silent whisper of his name slip past them. Her absolute defenselessness when it came to him slipped out in the way she said his name too and it made him feel protective and determined. His arms moved around her to enclose her against him better. It left her all but cradled in his arms and he nodded, barely there, continuing a conversation he'd forgotten the point behind, before lowering his mouth to find hers again.

The second kiss was better. He was more sure of himself and this time, after a stumbling moment on her part, her lips relaxed and softened under his. Only his ears picked up the soft, humming sound she made and between the two of them they found a way to fit their mouths closer together with a little tilt on his part and a slight lift of her chin on her part. That felt… even better… he managed to think as his arms wrapped more securely around her and he felt the tug of her long, slender fingers against the fabric of his shirt where they curled against his chest. A part of him was aware of the way her silk soft hair fell over his bare arms like water, of the way her chest was pressed against his, of how soft her skin felt, how good she smelled, how warm and gentle her body felt in his arms. Another part of him didn't know anything but the way her lips felt against and under his, how good she tasted and how every little rub and brush and slide sent pure electric and heat through him, until it was in his very blood, bubbling along as potent as the mako it flowed next to.

He wanted to keep her just like this forever.

Somewhere, very far away, Barrett cleared his throat. Cloud ignored him and it wasn't hard to do. After another long moment, Barrett coughed. Ignored again, he finally sputtered:

"All right, Spiky, all right! I was wrong. You can let her breath now." Another long pause and then he was laughing. "All right, you two. You're good. Shit, get a room or something."

Cloud was tempted to tell Barrett they already had a room and the man was on his own for the night but even thinking that much had his brain kicking back in. No. No, Tifa was more important than that. She always had been. He'd always known she was more. Reluctant his mouth left hers and he felt the escaping brush of her breath against his lips. Her body was relaxed and curled around his and it made him smile contentedly, head still lowered over her. He saw the dusting of pink when it rose through her pale cheeks and felt the way she tensed as she realized what they'd just done. For a second, his heart panicked. And then she turned her face into his throat, seeking shelter and safety in him, and his heart swelled dangerously in response. She was still looking to him for protection, still open to him – he hadn't lost her.

He raised his head to look at Barrett and the big man was shaking his head and still chuckling quietly, not about to challenge Cloud over whether the blond warrior had a right to hold the woman in his arms or not. It relaxed Cloud a little bit too and one corner of his lips shifted upward the slightest bit.

"Damn, Spiky!" From the look of it, Barrett would have pounded him on the shoulder if he wasn't safely across the table. "How long's that one been building up?"

'All my life', Cloud thought. 'Wanting to hold Tifa Lockhart in my arms and kiss her has been building up inside me all of my life.' He knew he should correct Barrett. He should tell the other man it was just pretend, just for show, that he'd only kissed her to warn off the other men. It would be a lie but it would be a lie that would keep things from changing between him and the woman that was still nestled close in his arms. Except… Except she was still nestled close in his arms and he didn't want to pretend. He'd spent too much time pretending already.

He didn't know what came next but he knew he didn't want to pretend anymore.

His eyes flicked up and caught the table of men by the door. They'd subdued and the eyes that had been watching flickered downward when they came up against the blue of his. It was just as well. Cloud, in that moment, would have personally beaten the tar out of anyone that looked at Tifa sideways right now. She was vulnerable because of him and no one was allowed to abuse that. Letting go of her with one arm, he reached out and retrieved his sword, sliding it awkwardly into place on his back before he gathered the woman that was turned into him for protection into his arms. He stood up and her head came up and looked at him, eyes surprised and again, he felt the surge in his male pride and a barely there smirk slipped across his lips.

"I'm not really an 'over the shoulder' guy," for the second time he teased her and, watching the laughter and light move into her eyes, he thought he just might learn how to do it more often. Her slender arms slipped up his chest and around his shoulders and she rested her head against him and didn't protest. Trusting him.

And Cloud Strife realized that, in the center of everything else, her trust in him had always been what he'd needed most of all.


	2. Chapter 2: Stray

_wow! So many thrilled and happy reviews. I LOVED those reviews, so detailed and enthusiastic - yum! __I've got to admit I feel a bit of pressure to live up to it - we'll see if I manage. __Wasn't sure if I was going to make this a stand alone one shot or just throw it in here. So - throw it in here it is! Got this idea when I heard the song 'Stray' from the anime Wolf's Rain - which I've never seen. But the song caught me and this is what came out. Another fic from Cloud's POV, an AU, and if you liked Intangible, you'll hopefully like this one too. Er- gore warning.  
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**Stray**

by TamLin

He dreams. He dreams of the sound of glass breaking and waking up alone and being small and scared. He dreams of his mother not being there where he's crawled into her bed earlier because the storm was casting scary shadows on his walls in his own tiny room. He dreams of clutching his stuffed chocobo to his chest and stumbling down the stairs because it's not safe, he's not protected by a bed, he needs his mother. He dreams and the dream splinters and its his mother's golden hair on the floor soaked in blood, its rain coming in the broken window, its dark and flashes of lightening, its glowing pale eyes and a dark furred, hunched form and the smell of blood and beast and gurgles as his mother tries to scream through her ruined throat and her eyes are looking at him and they're screaming and then the beast comes for him and he doesn't make a sound because his mother can't scream and so he can't either and its pain and pain and pain and –

And he wakes up shaking and sick to his stomach.

He hates that. Hates the dreams he can't leave behind. He hates being small and broken and feeling it over and over and over again. Water drips on him from an overhanging roof but its filthy and feels foul against his skin where it soaks past everything else. This whole place is filthy and foul and it leaves a taste like oil on his tongue that he can't get off. The water here is tainted and the food is rotted and the ground is sticky and dead. He sits up under the shelter of the cardboard boxes that are now soaked through and starting to disintegrate and carefully peers out into the darkness beyond. He's in an alley and he's filthy and his hair is matted and his nose is clogged because of all the bad things that fill the air here. He hates this place. It makes him even more miserable than he usually is. But he's here and he doesn't even know why he's here but he is and he can't seem to leave.

The alley is quiet at this hour of the night and he crawls out from under his unsuccessful shelter and shakes himself and for a minute it feels good but then the dirt and the oily air and the bad smells of the place settled down on him again and he sneezes and looks toward the mouth of the alley. His blue eyes adjust to the darkness and it's just as good as daylight to him. Better. Because it's not hot and he likes the blue way things look in the dark. He likes pale and dark and he shouldn't but he does.

He trots to the front of the alley and pauses in the shadows where his pale hair and glowing eyes are easier to hide and he looks around. He smells food and his stomach rumbles at him. Even when he's not hungry he still feels hungry but he's really hungry now because he's been hiding all day and he wants something hot and tasty and knows he's probably going to end up with something cold and rotten. But he goes out anyway because food is food and if he's learned anything it's – eat when you can, sleep when you can and never stop moving.

With a huff, he peels himself out of the shadows with an act of will and saunters down the middle of the sidewalk like he has a right to do it. People buy the act and don't try to stop him. Cloud moves deeper into the dying bowels of the city.

.0.0.

The pack of strays moves in on him while he's eating back behind a store. He sees them with his unnaturally blue eyes and keeps eating. He's hungry and the sandwich he stole is still hot and its meat is almost fresh and it tastes so good it makes him quiver and half lid his eyes with pleasure. He's big for his size and he's a strange smell to them and they should leave him alone. But the big leader of the pack is hungry too and he doesn't like strangers in his territory and so he growls low in his throat and advances on stiff legs. Blue eyes watch him and Cloud doesn't bother stop eating. Most of the time, because he doesn't respond to challenges, dogs will leave him alone. It confuses them because he doesn't play by their rules and he doesn't smell right. Usually it's enough but the big leader won't let it go. He tries to circle and Cloud reluctantly wolfs down the rest of the sandwich and now he's pissed too because he'd wanted to enjoy the taste, not just the memory of the taste, and he gets to his feet and lowers his head but its not submissive because his blue eyes don't lower and they're angry and electric and dangerous. Its almost enough to make the brute leader back off and Cloud watches him hesitate and can smell the uncertainty on him. He's pushed Cloud a little too far though by challenging him in the first place and Cloud's fighting down the cold fury inside himself. Because he's been small before and had others try to dominate him and hurt him and abuse him and treat him like trash and even though it was years ago, it still lies raw in his chest and across his mind and heart and he's sworn to never go back, never go back, never go back –

The dog in front of him backs up with his tail tucked and he almost doesn't let it go he's so angry. Except he feels guilty too because he's scared it and it's just a dumb animal and he feels like a bully all of the sudden. He stays on guard though with the ruff of his neck and shoulders raised and his eyes unblinking and narrow until the dog turns and scampers off with the rest of his pack. He only lets his tail drop and his head and shoulders sag after he can't smell them anymore. He's lost his sandwich and he's been a bully and scared a stupid dog. He tries to shake the feeling that he's messed things up again because in his head he knows he hasn't and that's just the way life goes but in his heart he feels bad, like he's just scared a little kid. He's still hungry but it's his heart that's hungry and it makes him feel miserable and he slinks out of the alley by a different route. He drinks from a puddle and loses the taste of the hot meat and spices to oily water but he thinks it's fair. He raises his head because no matter how guilty he feels he can't let himself stop paying attention. Bad things happen when you're not paying attention and so he starts to trot confidently down the sidewalk again past the glowing neon signs that snap extra bright to his eyes and the crowds of people that either avoid or ignore him.

He's just in the process of sitting in a doorway and watching the ugly cars going by, wondering why he's here and why, even though he longs to be out in the cold green mountains with the trees and the life and the fresh air, he can't seem to leave, when he smells it. Its so faint that he barely catches it past all the other smells but it makes him tip his head up and inhale again because suddenly his heart is too big for his chest even before he realizes why.

It was after the attack. After he'd been changed by the beast that he hadn't known at the time was his father. After he'd been carried, crying, back to the foul lair that others like his father had gathered in. They'd tormented him, made his first change even worse than he'd later found out it had to be. They'd enjoyed trying to make him scream and then gotten angry when he wouldn't. Except – he couldn't. His mother hadn't been able to scream and somehow she'd taken his screams with her too. It had been nightmarish and he still woke up sometimes shaking uncontrollably and needing to run, just run, never stop running. That's what he'd done then too. He'd made himself small and boring and the first chance he'd gotten, he'd run. He hadn't even known what he was yet or where he was or why. He'd just known he had to run and run and never stop running.

He hadn't learned how to pace himself back then and he'd finally collapsed.

And that was when he'd first fallen in love. With a smell.

He stumbles down the steps now as he searches for it again, chest aching as if he's run too far and too hard and a strange sense of absolute panic building inside of himself. The whine actually escapes him and he's never made sounds, except he can't seem to stop this one. For a long moment the rusty iron and leaking oils and polluted ground block everything else and he thinks he's going to scream even though he doesn't know how. Losing that scent will teach him to though. And then he catches it again, barely there and he pulls it into his lungs as if he was drowning and it's the only air he'll ever be given. Afraid now that he'll lose it, he concentrates carefully, honing all his senses and all the things he'd learned over his years and slowly, careful not to rush, he follows that whispered promise.

Long ago, that smell had been attached to a little girl and the first thing he'd known of her was her gentle hands on his torn, patchy fur and her father's rough voice yelling at her from a distance and telling her not to touch the diseased thing. It seemed from that point on, those two sensations would fill his world as he healed and grew.

He'd gone home. He hadn't realized it at the time but, when he'd escaped from the lair, he'd run back to the only place he knew. He'd run back to his house and his beautiful, safe mother because in his child's mind he'd known that if he could only get there, everything would be better again. Except it wasn't better. His once friendly little house was boarded over and it smelled funny. It smelled scary. His mother wasn't there either but he hadn't found any of that out at first. At first, he only knew he couldn't run anymore and the smell had soft hands and a nice voice and it hurt when she tried to pick him up because she was too small but that it still felt better than anything in his recent past. She'd taken him home with her despite her father who seemed very loud and not very strong at all when it came to his only daughter and she'd talked to him and stroked his hair and, even if she hadn't been his mother, she'd been female and soft and sweet and he'd fallen in love with her. Desperate, hopeless, helplessly in love with the dark haired little girl with the sad, sweet eyes and the skin that smelled like moon shadows.

He'd recognized her, once his fever had passed, known that she was the little girl he'd shyly watched from his own window that lived just next door to him and his mother. He'd thought she was loud and pretty back then but he hadn't realized how good she smelled or how soft her hands were or how nice her voice sounded after weeks of listening to screams and guttural laughter and howls and angry yells. He'd tried to tell her who he was, tried to ask about his mother, tried to even say his name but he couldn't. His face was built wrong now and his tongue wouldn't let him. It scared and frustrated and panicked him and for the very first time he actually felt anger but not matter what he did, he couldn't say anything at all. At first it confused her, why he would get so frantic and she would try to calm him down but after a little while she started to really pay attention and watch him. At the time, he hadn't realized how strange it was to find a child that would actually sit quietly and pay attention but even then he was grateful that she did. And then one day, while he was uncomfortably clinging to the window sill with his stubby new paws and barely staying balanced on his back legs, she'd come in and seen him standing with the sunlight on his golden fur looking out at his old house and feeling impossibly afraid and longing at the same time and she'd said his name.

"Cloud."

He'd lost his balance and she rushed over to him and wrapped her arms around him and buried her face in his fur and she'd said his name over and over and over again while he had wiggled in her embrace and tried to lick her face and laugh at the same time even though he'd lost the ability to laugh somewhere along with his screams.

His father hadn't believed her, of course. Wild animals had attacked the house next-door, unheard of, and the little boy that had once lived there had been carried off into the surrounding woods and eaten. Children didn't come back from something like that and they certainly didn't come back in the form of dandelion fluff blond puppies. Cloud had been shocked by the father's words and, as an adult, he was still shocked but only because they had been so blunt for such a little child to hear. She'd tried to take him to see his old house but they'd both gotten scared, even in broad daylight, and run back to the safety of her own yard with its flowering bushes and its trimmed grass.

They'd been – children together.

Even now those memories glowed in his mind, like warm golden sunlight. She'd treated him like a little boy and thrown an absolute fit any time her father had tried to treat him like a dog. He'd slept on an oversized pillow next to her bed but most nights they didn't stay that way. He'd crawl into her bed or she'd crawl down onto his because nighttimes were scary times and he knew it better than anyone. Sometimes they slept together under the bed.

He'd fallen hopelessly in love with her the way only a little child who didn't realize how impossible that was could.

They'd grown together, him growing into a sleek creature that looked more like a giant golden wolf every day and her into the beginning stages of heartbreaking beauty. It was a small town and people let her do what she wanted because they all adored her. Cloud sat next to her seat in school and learned the joys of chasing balls thrown by her friends and basked in their attention, never lacking in snuck food or pats or their faith in his ability to keep them safe.

The adults didn't like it so much though and he learned that he had names other than 'good doggie' and they were ugly and vicious and frightening. He didn't understand them but he could smell them and feel them when the adults spoke sometimes and some of the children that had once played so freely with him when he was small, stopped as he grew larger and stronger and faster. It made her furious and so he didn't have to be. He trusted her to keep him safe.

It was growing in him to keep her safe too even though he didn't understand it at the time. Just that his heart would freeze in his chest when she laughingly climbed too high in the trees or how nervous it would make him when she would travel up the mountain passes near their home when she explored. They didn't sleep under her bed anymore and nighttimes weren't so scary but he still crawled into her bed each night and sprawled out, seeing how much room he could take up before she laughed and pushed him onto his own side.

He was happy.

Happy.

The other boys started to notice her. Really notice her and so did some of the young men. He didn't like it, couldn't understand it, but she was his. His. Not theirs. The new attention puzzled her and she handled it carefully as if it were glass that could break and hurt someone, her or them or both. He saw worry in her eyes sometimes and knew it was because she was trying to figure out how not to hurt someone. She hated hurting people, even if it hurt her instead. Her father started ordering her to stay home more and more and her yard wasn't full of children the way it had once been. Now most of her friends were girls and even some of them said things in ways that Cloud knew weren't kind even though they smiled. He wanted…

He wanted something he couldn't explain or name but it made him restless. He took to roaming.

At first it was only for a few hours. He'd be careful to be home for her by dark. She would hug him and ask him where he'd been and didn't seem to mind. He remembered the first time he stayed out all night long and the look in her eyes when he'd been waiting outside her door the next morning to walk her to school. She'd been puzzled and curious and – and he'd been too stupid to realize it at the time, but he'd seen hurt in her eyes.

He'd stayed close for the next few days but then the restlessness had grown again and he'd been gone. His times away from her got longer and longer and he told himself it was all right because he'd always come back. She'd always be there. Nothing would ever change.

He remembered the night he came back to her house and found the door open. He remembered the ugly smell of blood and beast that had made the air so thick it had choked him.

He remembered smelling her blood.

He remembered the terror and the impossible guilt and he remembered jumping out into the dark night beyond and following the trail where her body had been dragged though the moonlight grass.

He remembered her sprawled form and the silver wolf with the green eyes over it and he remembered the impossible red rage and the unfamiliar sound of a snarl in his own throat and the flashing teeth that were his and other's and the pain and the fall over the mountain's edge and the black that came after.

He remembered not being able to remember anything but that he had four legs and teeth for the longest time and he remembered the young, spiky haired, black wolf he'd tried to kill that had taught him what they really were and helped put his shattered mind back together. He remembered going back and finding their houses both empty and overgrown and boarded up, leaking whispers of terror and death into the air around them.

He remembered running away and away and away.

A car horn honks at him now and he realizes he's wandered too close to the edge of the sidewalk in his attempt to follow the elusive smell of moonlight and shadows and peace. He's wandered too far back in his memories, lured there by the memory of laughing eyes and soft hands. With a shake of his head and a snort, he clears his mind and his nose. Tipping his ears back against his skull a little, he concentrates again and starts forward. Lured by that subtle scent.

He doesn't know what he expects to find. He just has to follow the scent the same way he has to breath. When he comes to the slightly more empty sidewalks and starts seeing the abandoned lots full of trash, he has to concentrate even harder past the new overwhelming smells and so he gets caught by surprise when he rounds a corner, nose close to the ground, and a body goes sailing over him. His head jerks up and his legs splay and the fight or flight instinct rears high in him. He hears a grunt of pain and in the dark his eyes show him three figures around a smaller one. His heart stops in his chest before he even realizes it and then his lips are pulling back from his teeth as his eyes narrow down. He smells blood and –

It's a scent right out of his memories.

It makes his stomach turn painfully and he hurls himself forward before he even has time to think. The small figure ducks low and one of the men bends double with a grunt of pain and staggers backward. A second later the thug is on his back thanks to a blow from the flat of a hand that catches him under the chin. Cloud is in the fray by then and he uses his bulk as much as his teeth. There is no hesitation, no mercy, and one of the men goes down screaming, clutching at his leg within seconds of Cloud's arrival. Cloud tastes blood and it tastes foul and rotten on his tongue but the rage is so high and he forgets why he's fighting, just that someone is trying to hurt him inside and he won't let them, not ever again, never again, not as long as he lives and he's lunging for the last man that's still standing –

Her scream might as well have been a chain around his throat for the way it jerks him backward in midair and he hits the man with his shoulder instead of his jaws because he is trying to twist in flight in response to her terror and his heart is in his throat and he knows she's dying again and he can't bear it, can't bear it, can't…

His feet hit the ground and he stumbles. The man he's barreled into falls, and then scrambles to his feet and runs, dragging his moaning, bleeding partner with him and leaving the unconscious one behind. Cloud's eyes are desperate and terrified as he spins toward her. He can smell her blood in the air and it's clogging his head and his heart. She's crouched down on the ground as if she's fallen and her arms are up in front of her and she is older and so much more beautiful than he remembered. He starts forward and she scrambles backward with terror in her scent. Terror that hadn't been there when she'd been fighting the men that had encircled her just moments ago.

It tears his heart in his chest and he starts forward another step. And watches in growing horror as she scrambles backward again with a cut off sound in her throat and her eyes are wide and white rimed in terror. Terror when she looks at him.

He feels it like a bolt of steel through his chest and it makes his legs give out from under him. It's the only thing that keeps him from running. He goes onto his belly in front of her and lowers his chin into the bloody dirt, ears pressed back against his skull. His throat feels tight and painful and he wants to whine, he hurts so badly. Don't. He wants to beg it but of course no sound comes out of him. Don't. I was never a monster before because of you but if you say I am now, I will be forever…

Her hands are shaking as she lowers them from their defensive guard in front of her and her breathing is uneven. Her shirt is torn as her waist where a knife has cut it and that is where the blood comes from. His eyes see it and he knows, if she turns him over to the monsters, he will hunt down the men that did that to her and rip them to pieces. She gets her knees under her and scoots back a little further from him and he stays pressed down into the dirt, his heart shattering inside his chest until he can't breath anymore, and watches her go. Look at me, he wants to scream. Look at me and forgive me for not being there for you. For being too late. For not being enough for you.

Forgive me.

Forgiveness was only given to people who deserved it though and he knows he doesn't. It makes him want to die for the first time in his life and he presses his hollow chest deeper into the hard earth.

"… cloud…?"

The word trembles in the soaked night air and he opens the eyes he had squeezed so tightly shut and looks at her. Her hand is over her chest, not over her stomach where she should be blocking the thin flow of blood, and her other hand is flat on the ground near her knees. She looks small and suddenly, painfully young and her eyes are the frightened eyes he remembers coming to find him on stormy nights when he was barely bigger than a large cat himself.

He forces the whine out of his constricted throat and stays the way he is, trying to make himself small against the ground. He's trembling himself and he hurts so badly inside but he doesn't dare move, can't move. Slow, hesitant, with none of the careless bravery she'd once shown approaching a strange animal, she moves closer. He stays where he is and watches her and the fear in her breaks him a little more each second. Her hand lifts and hovers over his head for a moment and he shuts his eyes because it hurts so badly. He feels the touch, feather light. Feels the way it barely moves his hair and still it sends tingles running down through him like ants slipping through his fur. He tries to stop it and shivers anyway.

"Cloud – " her voice comes out choked then and suddenly he feels her weight, her wonderful, comforting, soft weight as she throws herself over him and her arms are wrapped over him as well and she is silently crying and holding him and he is dying, dying, dying inside and he is so happy he wishes he remembered how to cry as well. Her touch frees him from the chains her cry had laid on him and he twists against her to be closer and to wrap himself more completely around her. He buries his nose in her skin and smells that scent that is only hers, moonlight whispers and childhood lullabies and everything that is beautiful and clean in the world and he groans deep in his throat, a human sound distorted by elongated larynx and neck. Her fingers dig into him and it makes him shudder in pleasure. She has been dead, he'd known she was dead and yet –

and yet, he of all people should know that sometimes dying isn't as clean as that.

He inhales then, searching, but there is nothing on her that isn't entirely her. No trace of beast, no trace of anything but soft, warm human female. And blood. He smells her blood again and it steals his contentment away from him. She is draped over him and so it isn't hard to simply turn his head a little and let his tongue find her.

Her skin tastes sweet and salty at the same time and it burns his tongue and makes him shiver again. She makes a jerking noise against him as well and sits up and he follows her and runs his tongue over her stomach where the cut is shallow.

"Cloud!" she sounds as if she's laughing and yet there is something else in her voice too, as if she'd just lost her breath. She's pushing gently at him but he's determined, drawn by the taste of her that is better than anything in the world and he presses in, dragging his tongue over her skin again and again. She makes another noise and twists away, hands against him to hold him off but he is stronger than she is and he follows. Then she's laughing at him and her arms are around his neck and she has her face buried in his fur, chiding him for being such a worrywart over such a little cut and he has to stop but her taste lingers on his tongue and makes his mouth dry. Her laughter fills the emptiness the lack of her skin has left and it makes his heart rise in his chest. Because it's the same laughter he remembers, without a trace of mockery or bitterness or sorrow in it. She makes a noise and draws back just enough to meet his eyes with her own and her eyes are clear and warm and sweet and soft and drowning.

"You're filthy!" she tells him and he snorts and she laughs again and then she is on her feet and all but dancing down the street in front of him, facing backward so that she can keep her eyes on him. He wants to keep his eyes on her too, afraid she'll disappear and he jumps to his feet and chases after her. She runs but she is laughing and her steps aren't that quick. He catches up to her easily and bounds along next to and in front of her, each bound taking him high in the air. She's laughing at him and her long, dark hair sways as they run down the sidewalk in the middle of the night. People move out of their way but Cloud only has eyes for her and his heart flies in his chest.

In their own world, they dance up the rickety wooden stairs that lead to a small apartment over a drug store and she unlocks the bolts on it and lets them in. Its small and sparse and full of her scent and the warm feel of her presence. She locks the locks while he stands politely and waits instead of wandering through the place the way his nose wants him too and she laughs at him, somehow knowing. The keys get dropped into a small clay red bowl on the tiny table next to the door that also serves as a dining room table apparently.

"Kitchen," she gestures to the tiny corner right next to the door where a stove and ice box crowd together next to a sink and standing cabinet. "Living room." The rest of the room they are in with a worn looking sofa that has a colorful blanket thrown over it and a wooden chest that seems to serve as coffee table, footrest, storage. There is a bookcase against the wall and another chest under the window with cushions thrown on it. "Bedroom, bathroom in here." She gives his ear a light tug that doesn't even ruffle his fur and he follows her through the only door in the room.

Her bedroom is even smaller and her narrow bed takes up most of it, pushed up against the far wall. He inhales and smells her, soft and intimate…

And no one else.

She sleeps here alone and it makes something in his chest unravel just a little bit and he feels strangely weak in his legs. She dances through the room without noticing it and into the bathroom and he takes another deep inhale of her wonderful smell and follows her in.

She's getting towels out of the small cabinet over the toilet and she gestures to the tub.

"In."

He jerks back a little and looks at her with shocked eyes and… she laughs at him! He shoots her a hurt look and she goes down on her knees with the towels in her lap and takes his shaggy head in her hands, leaning in to press a kiss between his eyes.

"Silly Cloud. It's for your own good. You smell like you rolled in garbage. You're not staying here without a bath first."

And it isn't until she says it that he realizes he will be staying with her. And, even more, she has never expected anything else but that. He huffs and looks at the tub and she grins at him and gives him another kiss, which convinces him to carefully heave himself into the old tub. She ties her shirt up around her ribs and he makes a noise. Gingerly, she touched the cut on her stomach and he can't seem to pull his eyes away from the trail of her fingers against her pale skin.

"It's okay. See? It's not half as deep as it looked," she tells him and it is true. It isn't as deep as it had been. Not anymore. By tomorrow it won't even be there. He feels better about himself because of it but the memory of her taste lingers in his mouth and makes his stomach tighten.

She puts her hair up in a ponytail and it still falls down past her waist. Then she comes over next to the tub and kneels down to turn on the faucet. As her hand moves absently though the water, testing its temperature and Cloud feels the beginning lap of it against his front paws, she murmurs:

"I know I should be asking how you're here. You can't be my Cloud from when I was a child. Dogs don't live that long. Wolves don't live that long. You can't be my Cloud and I should wonder who you are and why you're so like him." She adjusts the knobs as she softly talks and doesn't look at him as he stands in the tub and watches her. "Just the same way there's no way you could be that little boy that was murdered in the house next to mine when I was a child. I know I made that part up the way little kids do to make things make sense. I know all of that and I know right now doesn't make any sense at all and," she pauses and turns her head to look at him. "You know what? I just don't care. I don't care how or why. I'm just… I'm just glad you're here, you know? I'm afraid if I look at it too closely you'll turn out to not be Cloud and I don't want to do that right now. Okay?"

She sounds so hopeful and hopeless, so determined and lost, that all he wants to do is have her pressed up against him again so he can tuck around her and make everything right. Even though he's learned a long time ago that it's impossible to ever make anything really right. Instead he exhales and leans forward to bump his forehead against hers and she makes a little laughing sound that sounds a lot like tears too and puts her arms around him again.

"I have missed you," she tells him softly. "I really have."

It heals something in his heart when she says it.

He stands patiently while she scrubs him down. She's gone back to laughing and teasing and threatened him with something that smells like strawberries but his long suffering sigh has convinced her to just use soap and whatever kind she uses is something that smells clean and barely there. It makes a lot of bubbles and he snaps at them to make her laugh again while she scrubs his back under the hot water. It feels…

It feels like heaven must feel.

He shuts his eyes and lets his head sag down and makes a muted groaning sound as her strong fingers scrub over him, long and clever as they work the tangles out of where his fur is thicker and the clots of trash that have accumulated from weeks of living on the streets. Her fingers scratch at his chest, remembering where he likes it as she cleans him there as well and then they trail a bit lower and he feels his stomach tighten as her fingers move across it methodically. He forgets to breath and then her hands are shifting up his sides and working at his hips. He wishes he could smile at the very subtle way she avoids certain areas of his body. It was always her actions even more than her words that told him she saw him as something other than an animal.

"I hear you snorting," she tells him and he really does snort in answer, making her hum her laughter.

By the time she gets done, he's gloriously clean and the water that is seeping off of him is finally running clear. He feels alive and whole again and hadn't even realized how deeply the filth of this place had dragged on him until it isn't coating him anymore. She makes a tsking noise as she turns off the water and starts to dry him after he's shaken enthusiastically while she hides behind the towel.

"You haven't been eating," she chides. "I can feel your ribs. Don't worry. I'll fix that. It'll be nice to cook for someone else for a change."

He feels whole and content under her care and just exhales his opinion, simply at peace to be back with her again. He hadn't felt…

He hasn't felt human except when he has been with her…

She kicks him out of the bathroom then, telling him it's her turn for the shower and he goes with good-natured patience. Once the door is shut and he hears the water through the pipes he sets out to explore her small apartment. It isn't a nosy nature, though he had that too. Its to see how well he can defend it and how he can get out of it if he needs to take her with him. He has his front paws braced on the window sill and is looking suspiciously out of it at the ugly brick wall of the building across from them when the bathroom door opens and she comes back out. He turns his head to look at her over his shoulder and his stomach tightens again when he realizes she's only wrapped in a towel and her wet hair is clinging to her bare shoulders and falling down her back. For a long moment they both freeze. Until she smiles, just a little bit sadly.

"I remember," she tells him, voice soft. "I knew you weren't a dog the first time I saw you looking out my bedroom window at the house next door. Somehow, I knew you were the little boy that would never talk to me when I played in the yard next to his."

He'd… never talked to… her? He blinks in surprise. His childhood… it was hard for him to remember what it had been liked before his change except in nightmares. But he remembers he hadn't talked to her. She'd been – so alive and bubbly and happy all the time and he'd been… so shy and sure she'd laugh at him. He hadn't talked to her but he'd never thought of it that way. He pushes away from the window and goes over to her and she smiles a little bit fuller this time and leans down to rest her forehead against his and tug lightly at his ear before straightening.

"Now go be a gentleman and wait in the living room while I change. I'll make us both something to eat."

He grunts his agreement with the idea and she laughs at him.

"A real dog would 'woof'," she chides and he just gives her a look from the edges of his blue eyes and trots into the tiny living room to jump up on the sofa and lay down. He hears her laughing and then listens to the comforting sounds of her moving around in the other room. He feels… at peace. He can't remember a time since he'd thought she was dead that he's felt peace.

She comes out a short time later in a loose t-shirt and shorts that bare most of her legs. He feels his chest tighten at how long and pale and smooth they look and has the sudden image of them wrapping around him, strong and sleek, and he has to shut his eyes and shake himself. When he opens them again, she's watching him with a puzzled expression on her face but gives him a shrug and shakes her head before she goes into the kitchen. He stays on the couch and watches her as she moves with unconscious grace around the small area. Soon the smells coming from the little stove are almost enough to distract him from the way her body moves when she isn't paying attention.

She has the radio on quietly and as she forgets he's there, she sways a little to certain songs that came on, even singing softly along with them as she works. He thinks he could stay the way he is and watch her forever. Except…

Except he wants to be there with her too. He wants to feel her swaying against him. He just… he just wants to stand behind her with his hands on either side of the counter and her between his arms and feel her as she dances and makes them dinner. It makes his palms tingle.

She turns to set bowls out on the table and catches him watching her and her cheeks dust pink as she gives him a smile.

"Don't laugh at me," she warns, teasing, but laughing is the last thing on his mind. Instead he gets off of the couch and moves over to the table where she pulls the chair back and he jumps easily onto it and sits down. He turns his head to look at her and she smiles contentedly at him before turning back to the stove and ladling out a giant bowl full of something that smells delicious and meaty and warm. She sets it in front of him and he waits patiently while she gets herself a slightly smaller bowl and fills a glass with water for herself and a bowl for him. Only after she's sat down does he lower his head and take his first taste and then he sighs audibly in pleasure and feels her pleasure too.

He'd learned how to eat politely for her when they were still children, something his mentor and friend had never managed to get the hang of, and he doesn't lose his manners now. He finishes everything and when she asks:

"More?"

He dips his chin in a nod and makes a short humming sound of affirmation. She smiles and gets him more and he watches her. Wishing he could say 'thank you'.

"You're welcome," she tells him anyway and gives him a wink as she sets the bowl back down in front of him and then clears away her own bowl. Everything else is washed by the time he finishes his second bowl and for the first time in forever he actually feels contentedly full. She slips the dishes out from in front of him and sends him off to the living room couch again where he dozes with one eye closed and watches her clean up. Peace steals up over him again and makes him nervous.

He'd been happy before. He'd been at peace before. He'd had faith in the future before.

That had ended in blood and a fall that had taken him so much further down than just the side of a mountain.

She comes over when she gets done and rubs her hand over the top of his head and it soothes him, steals some of the venom out of the worry.

"You ready for bed?" she asks him and he grunts in his throat and gets up, hopping off the couch to follow her into the other room. She disappears into the bathroom and comes back a little later with the faint smell of peppermint on her breath. He waits until she crawls into bed first and holds the covers open for him and then he jumps up onto the bed as well. It creaks under his added weight and he turns around a few times to find a comfortable spot before he settles down between her and the door. She turns off the light, laughing at him in the dark and he feels one of her slender arms slip over his side as she snuggles in against his back.

"You always were such a fussy sleeper, Cloud Strife," she teases him and he snorts a noise just to hear her laugh again.

His eyes adjust to the scanty light that filters in the shades over the single window and he listens to the sounds of life outside on the street below. They're peaceful and non-threatening. Against him, his dark haired girl twitches a little as she falls asleep, sighing contentedly. He lets himself doze on the rhythm of her own exhales and then, very slowly, when he is sure she's deeply asleep, he rolls to face her under her arm. And as he rolls he calls up the training his dark haired friend taught him and forces down the beast and calls up the man. The gold fur sinks and absorbs into skin that retains a hint of gold despite its pale color. His nose and mouth shrink and his teeth retract. Paws elongate and spread and divide as his ears shrink and slip down on his skull. Soon, he is a man. Just a man. A man with gold colored, shaggy hair and cerulean blue eyes. It does nothing to change his eyesight though. In front of him, one bare arm still slipped over his waist, sleeps the woman he's loved all his life and he reaches out carefully, cautiously, suddenly unsure of himself, to touch her face. Afraid to find he can only feel her skin through the rough pad of a paw or that, worse, she will disappear in front of him like morning mists.

The skin of her cheek is like flower petals under the pads of his fingertips and it makes him shudder. She hums in response, an almost questioning noise, asking, even in her sleep, what's bothering him. Nothing is bothering him though and he smooths the hair back from her face the way he's wanted to do a thousand times before and is amazed. Her lips relax in her sleep and very slowly, very careful not to wake her, he draws her into his arms and pulls her in close against his body, closing his eyes at the amazing feel of it, of her, of this, of them. Needing to, he lets one of his hands slip down her body and curve around her bare thigh, sliding it up so that her leg rests across the outside of his and her skin is smooth and soft and warm against his. It lets him breath again and he tangles fingers in her hair as she pushes herself unconsciously closer. His heart is threatening to break apart in his chest and he buries his face in her shadow dark hair and for the first time in forever…

He smiles.


	3. Chapter 3: In the Dark

_Okay, this was originally posted as a stand alone but I think I'm just going to move it to my drabbles folder. I've got a bit of a Spring cleaning burr going on and feel like organizing a bit. We'll return to your regularly scheduled program shortly._

**In the Dark**

by TamLin

I woke up in the dark.

Of course, dark is a relative term when you've got mako-enhanced eyes. To me, nothing was ever completely dark. Even with my eyes closed I still saw green. Now, looking around me, I saw things in shades of gray and decided not to find the metaphor for my life in that.

I was in a small room with a packed earth floor and someone had been nice enough to think to put a thin mattress of sorts under me so I wasn't in the dirt. There was even a blanket over me even though, again, the mako that ran through my blood kept me warm. I was alone and my hearing picked up nothing.

With a grunt, I rolled to my feet. Since I was alone I didn't have to stilt my movements or slow them down to keep from scaring other people. My lungs hurt a little. Whatever they'd used on me had been strong, strong enough to knock out an ex-SOLDIER First Class and that was saying something.

It was saying they'd known what they were dealing with.

I left the blanket on the mattress and took the three steps that brought me to the door. Not expecting anything I tried the lift latch. A part of me felt stupid for even doing that but a larger part of me knew I'd feel more stupid if I never tried it and, for some unexplained reason, it was unlocked and I'd just sat there in my cell the entire time.

It was unlocked.

I felt my eyebrows jerk upward in puzzlement and my hand automatically went behind me to feel for the comforting grip of my weapon. It wasn't there of course. I'd already known that because I hadn't felt its weight but still…

Curious and cautious, I pushed the door open. Mako polluted as I was, there wasn't a lot I was afraid of. Physically. Emotionally – that was a different story but it was my story and I don't share that one.

The door swung open silently and I took the automatic step that would take me out of the little room to find myself in a slightly larger room. It had an earth floor too and the walls were cheap wood substitute. There was a large table in the middle of the room, maps of Midgar on the walls, a small ice chest… bedrolls neatly made and stacked to the side. I walked over to one of the bedrolls and knelt to strip off the cord that bound it shut, slipping it up my single sleeve. Safety precaution. Fists were nice. Having a garrote up your sleeve was nice too. While I was kneeling, I scraped my finger over the floor and lifted the residue to my nose. My glove was such a familiar smell that I could automatically sort it away from the other scents. I smelled feet and sweat. Maybe a little blood. Beer? And something else I couldn't explain. Something that smelled… green. Except I knew the smell of Midgar's dead soil and there was nothing green in it. It did tell me what the heavy silence had already though. I was underground somewhere. Flicking my fingers together I stood up and moved around the room. Looking for the way out.

If they were nice enough to leave my door unlocked, maybe they'd be nice enough to leave the way out the same way. There wasn't another door to the room though. I got myself a bottle of water out of the ice chest and shook my hair back from my forehead before I drank it. That helped and I narrowed my eyes and looked around the room again.

There was a spot in the corner that was scuffed and I walked over and looked up. Above me was a wooden ceiling. Someone must have double layered it because I couldn't see any light coming through the boards on most of it and it was still quiet where I was. Just overhead though there was the smallest difference of light and I could make out a trap door of sorts. Careful study showed me no way up to it but I was better than that.

The walls were cheap and my knuckles went through them easily.

I controlled my blows, something I'd learned to do when I was dealing with 'normal' people, and soon I was slowly working my way up the wall in that corner, using the holes in the plywood for toe and finger holes. I was making noise but not too much and if anyone was above me they were quieter than most people knew how to be even sitting still. It got me to the trap door and I reached out carefully and felt along its edges as far as my arms could reach.

It would have been nice to be a little bit taller, even though I knew I had long arms and legs for someone my height.

I found the hinges on the trapdoor though. Inside. So the door dropped downward. I had no idea about architecture so I didn't know if that made it more stable or less so for people standing on it. There was no latch on my side. Because no one was there to see I let myself frown as I hung there and puzzled over it. The wall I was hanging on like some freakish black spider wasn't the most stable and it took that moment to remind me by swaying under my weight slightly. I stayed still until it was done, gloved hand carefully braced against the ceiling.

I could try punching upward through the door and hope that I could either do it in one blow or that no one was nearby close enough to stop me before I got enough blows to shatter it. They'd used something SOLDIER strong to knock me out origonally though and it made me cautious in dealing with the unknown. I didn't want to give up my element of surprise. Bracing myself as well as I could I raised my other glove to my mouth and got the cufflink that kept it shut off. It had my personal symbol on it, a joke that had become something more, that had become a reminder of better times and what I was now. I had the same emblem on my shoulder guard as well and my ears. It was actually what some people called me these days. What was a name after all, but what people chose to call you?

I used the cufflink and went to work on the screws that held the hinges in place. It was awkward and the wall kept threatening to drop me or buckle but I was good at being patient. What else was I going to be doing anyway? Buffing my boots?

I left the screws enough in place that the side I'd worked free wouldn't sag too noticeably and went to work on the other hindge. It left my brain with too much quiet time to think and I tried to keep it from wandering backward into the past by focusing on what I'd do when I had the trap door open. Since that was basically 'rip it down, climb out, and deal with whoever was in the room above', it didn't exactly take up genius levels of brainpower but it was distraction enough that I got the second hinge loose enough for my fingers. I snapped the cufflink back in place and then braced a shoulder while I wiggled my fingers to work the cramps from the close work out of them.

Why couldn't I have been born tall?

Of course, a tall person would have had a harder time working in the small space I'd squeezed myself into but the extra arm reach would have been nice. Well, as mom used to say –

If wishes were chocobos, we'd all ride.

Which was a silly thing to say. I knew it was meant to be clever but if wishes really were chocobos we wouldn't ride. We'd be in feathers and chocobo dung up to our as-

The floor above me creaked and I decided it was time to stop stalling and just get on with things. If anyone tried to open the trap from above, my tampering would be obvious. If they stood on it –

I reached up and got my fingers under the hinges even though it hurt and I was probably ruining another pair of gloves. Taking a breath and bracing myself as well as I could because I was going to be pulling the trap door toward me and that was just going to make things awkward, I exhaled and concentrated as I yanked.

It wasn't my strongest pull. I wasn't set up for using my full muscle strength in the position I was in. It was enough though and the trap door came down with a horrible crashing noise that hurt my ears. I wrenched it down and to the side again so that where it was bolted broke as well. I hear yells above me but they were at a slight distance and so I let the door go and caught the splinted lip of the hole in the roof/floor with my hands and bodily hoisted myself out. I registered the body barreling down on me even as I did and so I braced my arms over the hole and kicked up and out with my legs, letting them unfold as they cleared the opening. The thick soles of my boots caught him in the knees and he went down and backward. I kept the momentum and flipped myself backward and onto solid ground.

Somewhere, far away in the back of my head, something was laughing at me. I was still automatically making my movements slower than they could be just so I wouldn't scare the 'normals'. 'Normals' that had tried to lock me up in a hole in the ground and used SOLDIER strength drugs on me to knock me out.

In my peripheral I noticed I was in a larger room now and that it was crowded with furniture at one end. It had a high ceiling. There was a window behind me made of stained glass. A part of me, the stupid part, wanted to avoid breaking that window if I could help it. It was pretty and the world didn't have a lot of pretty things left in it…

My training kicked in then and that was where the difference between a Shinra grunt and one of its First Class SOLDIERs showed. Logically, I was in a strange situation and surrounded by people I hadn't had time to scope out. I should go out that window and make my escape to report what was happening to my superiors. Problem with that was that SOLDIERs weren't trained to run and I had no superior to report to anyway. That, and the day a bunch of 'normals' became a problem for me was the day I needed to retire.

Except of course I'd been 'retired' years ago…

I was in my travel gear but the duster that covered one of my legs and protected it when I rode was no hindrance and my pants were loose fitting enough that they didn't restrict my movements either. I blocked the next two blows from different men with my forearms and then lashed out with my legs, dropping low and sweeping their ankles out from under them. I was back up on my feet in an entirely different section of the room before they hit the floor and delivering my own blows to new strangers, fists working methodically.

There was something wrong with me. I had always enjoyed fighting.

I had no intention of running of course. I intended to beat everyone in the room into submission and then get some answers. Answers to questions like why they'd thought kidnapping me was a smart move in the first place.

I drove an elbow into someone's jaw and since it was the arm that was sleeveless, his teeth broke my skin there. I noticed it but didn't feel the pain. That would come later. I just hoped he hadn't gotten any of my blood in his mouth. Mako-tainted blood could do nasty things to an unprepared body if they got too much of it in them.

For a minute my rhythm faltered as the vision of someone I'd loved – someone I thought I might have loved, or at least would have if I'd been given the chance, lying in a pool of blood that was mine and theirs in a broken mako reactor somewhere that was miles from Midgar and years ago flashed in front of my eyes.

That was the problem with mako. It messed with your head. I knew I'd been unconscious by the time that had happened. It didn't stop me from being able to see the way their hair had been soaked with our blood or the way it had discolored their pale skin.

The blow to the back of my head caught me off guard and I fell forward and let the momentum keep carrying me right back to my feet. Then I heard one of the men shout something and I heard the relief in his voice. Without even needing to think, my head swung around and I focused on the newest arrival to the fight. It made me blink again because it was a Shinra grunt in full gear, right down to the helmet and, in my mind, still recovering from being pushed years backward, I was glad to see him for a minute too. Just because, in the past, Shinra guards had been a comforting thing. Even before he charged toward me however I was already shaking that off. Shinra, and my life there, was years in the past. My life now was drastically different and I clenched my fists to feel the rub of my leather gloves and hear their creak.

He met me in the middle of the room and I swerved to the side and drove my open palm upward to catch him in the chest and sent him flying backward. Except –

My palm didn't make contact. He was jumping backward and then swinging back in again and I barely got my forearm in the way, black fabric of my sleeve swinging. It made my eyes go just a little bigger and I closed with him quickly. We were about the same size and I should have had no problem with him except –

Except –

Except he was moving too fast. And when his fists did find me, there was too much power behind them. I adjusted but not as fast as my mind told me I should have. I was fighting 'normals'. The man in front of me…

Wasn't.

It made no sense and even as my body remembered how to fight someone else like me and adjusted, my mind scrambled. No one – **no one** – was supposed to have survived except for me. I was the last SOLDIER First Class. All the others were dead. The program had been considered a failure and funds had been diverted to machine based soldiers and weapons. I'd accepted that I was the last, the only one of my messed up, psychologically unbalanced, mako enhanced kind left.

So why was the Shinra grunt I was fighting moving like a SOLDIER, and more, a SOLDIER First Class from the moves he knew? My mind, so busy thinking, wasn't concentrating the way I should have been and I took a blow to the chest that sent me flying backward into what I'd discovered were church pews. I braced my arms and back flipped to clear where I'd fallen and the soldier's blow just missed where he'd gone in for the kill there. It made my eyes narrow and I closed with him again. I knew each of the SOLDIERs First Class personally and this man wasn't any of them. I'd figure out who and what he was later. After I'd knocked him unconscious.

The fight that followed was brutal and yet it woke up something inside me that had been sleeping for years. To prove how broken I was inside, I'd always found a certain beauty in fighting and there was something impossibly graceful and intimate about the way SOLDIER First Class fought when they were fighting each other and not holding back. There was a strange, for lack of a better word, _trust_ involved in it because you were the only things that could really hurt each other and, even when you were trying your hardest to do just exactly that, there was a strange equal measure of understanding. It was the only time you were allowed to really be exactly what you'd been made into. It was impossible to explain but, it was almost a strange relief to be fighting someone that was –

Like me.

I finally saw my opening and caught the guard's wrist. I bent low and spun, dragging him off balance. He swept his foot out at the last minute and knocked me off my feet as well. We fell in a pile but I'd been expecting it and he hadn't and so I was on top when we landed. I reached down and ripped off his helmet to deliver the blow that would put him down –

And I saw the hair color. No, I saw the hair itself.

My movements stuttered to an abrupt stop and in that moment the pretend guard moved their leg and caught me in the ribs, knocking us both over. This time they ended up on top and I could only stare dumbly up at -

At a face I'd last seen while I lay in my own blood because a silver haired man had opened me up from collarbone to rib cage and left me to bleed out on the concrete floor in the dark. A face that had brought me comfort long before that fateful moment and, thinking I was dying at the time, it was a face I'd been glad would be the last one I'd see.

Now, years later and not dying, I lay on my back and looked up at the face from all that time ago – at the person I'd been told was dead by the Turks when they'd rescued me. Hesitant, I raised my hand and they didn't bat it away or stop me as I touched their cheek, very lightly, still not sure they were real. They did smile at me though when I touched them and it was the same soft, quiet smile I remembered. My throat was tight and I could barely get their name out.

"Cloud?"

His eyes, which had once been endlessly blue, now had a mako-green tint in their center and they softened when I said his name. His voice was just as low and soft as I remembered.

"Hey, Tifa."


	4. Chapter 4: Stray II

_okay. I'm not going to make it a habit of continuing the one-shots I put in my drabbles section. But.... LOL! There was such a great response to the first _Stray_, the wonderful person that edits my _Tales Within Tales_ fic and puts up with all of my misplaced commas, forgotten apostrophies, and fascination with random dashes deserved something special and loves this particular character and - mostly at the end of the day - because the story just wouldn't let me go with a single chapter - I had to write just a little more. Hopefully this will get it all out of my system. And make all the wonderful reviewers who've been so generous, enthusiastic and detailed with their reviews happy. 'Cause if I can give back even a little measure of the joy I get whenever I get a review in my inbox to the people that left them for me, I think that's time very well spent indeed._

**Stray II**

by TamLin

He's in the trash.

He loves trash! Trash is wonderful, trash is interesting. Trash… is delicious.

When you're out traveling it isn't easy to find trash. Even the little towns that you pass through don't have satisfying trash. No, that's all just papers and dust and dirt and bits and pieces of broken things. But trash – real, honest, smell-it-a-mile-away trash – that's the kind of thing you only find in the big cities.

Zack loves trash.

He's up to his neck in it now because he's found a really good sized dumpster out behind a restaurant. Egg drips onto his shoulders and strange and, no doubt, exotic things squish excitingly between his toes. There's some pasta across his hip, something flaky and possibly cream filled on top of his head and he's found something that tastes like pork. It might be pork. He thinks it's possible at least. He finishes the piece he's eating and then sticks his head under the mound of plastic containers and cardboard boxes and used napkins to find another piece of the maybe, possibly at one time, might have thought about being pork.

It is really good.

The next piece he finds is a little bit on the chewy side but he's a determined kind of guy and so he sits down where he is and chews. It doesn't taste exactly like the last piece did but it is pretty good too and as he chews he looks around, pale blue eyes peering over the rim of the dumpster.

Where is he again?

Oh. Yeah. Midgar. He's come to Midgar. 'Cause that's where Cloud has gone. Not that Cloud told him that's where he's gone but he's really good at finding things – like the trash, for instance, something he's still proud of himself over – and so he knows how to find Cloud. He tries to scratch behind his ear in pleasure at his own cleverness but he slips on something, well, slippery, and ends up going down in a pile of take out boxes.

Score!

Egg rolls!

He spits out what he had been chewing on and goes for the broken egg rolls instead. They're starting to go bad but that kinda adds a nice texture to them and he likes it. Shrimp maybe? Something like fake shrimp? Canned shrimp maybe. Or chicken. He can't tell. It's really good though.

His head comes up then and his ears perk forward as he hears the back door of the restaurant open. Maybe they're bringing out _more_ trash. He should ask them for sweet and sour sauce! With that thought in mind, he stands up and braces himself against the lip of the metal bin to look over the top of it with a grin.

The girl that had been bringing out the box of empty glass bottles sees him and she screams. The box falls, the bottles smash and the girl goes tearing back inside, still screaming. Zack frowns and wonders if he has something on his face. It's a sad day when a guy can't even smile at someone. The door slams open and a large angry looking man with a baseball bat in his hand comes out and Zack decides it's probably time to take in some fresh air, see some sights, visit foreign locations and otherwise be elsewhere. Without effort, he vaults the lip of the trash bin and onto the cracked asphalt of the alley and the big man staggers backward a bit in dismay. Zack shakes himself to get the worse of the food off and gives the man a rakish grin. Then, before the guy can recover, Zack sprints off down the alley and deeper into the city.

Maybe he'll see if there's a pizza place around here somewhere.

0.0.0.

He picks up Cloud's scent twice and both times it's wrapped around something distinctly feminine. It puzzles Zack because Cloud is anti-social. Or shy. Zack doesn't really understand either emotion so he can never tell for sure. He decides to remember the female scent for later. It seems like the kind of thing that might be important. He follows it to a small bar but the place is locked because it's too early in the day. Cloud's scent is dominant there though. Zack decides he'll come back later on and find out why his friend has become a boozehound.

After he sits down and laughs at his own joke, he clears his throat and gets back up to trot off in a different direction. He figures he's got a couple of hours before the bar opens and he has no idea what time after it opens that Cloud shows up. He's not stalking his friend so if he misses him today he'll catch him tomorrow. It's just…

It's just that Zack has found out he gets lonely when Cloud wanders off for too long. It's a strange feeling because Zack isn't used to being lonely. He's sociable by nature and doesn't usually have a problem finding people or wolves or dogs or even cats to hang around with but there's something about Cloud that makes him feel…

Centered.

It doesn't make sense because Zack doesn't think he was _un_centered before Cloud stumbled into his life and tried to rip his throat out. There's just something about the blond wolf that makes him happy inside his chest in a way he isn't when Cloud's not around. And since Zack likes being happy, it makes sense that when he and Cloud wander apart, he makes it a point to make sure they wander back together again eventually.

It's a little weird that they're such good friends, in a way. Cloud is the strangest one of their kind that Zack's ever met. The blond doesn't even admit he's one of them for that matter. He acts and thinks as if he really is a man that just happens to be able to become a wolf, as if it was a cripple arm or some kind of allergy. As far as Zack can tell, Cloud doesn't even hear his wolf inside him the way the rest of them do. In a group of solitary creatures, Cloud is still entirely set apart. Zack loves being a wolf. In fact, he tries very hard not to remember his life before he became one. He was taught that his loyalty was to his furred kind before humans. But for some reason, he and Cloud fit together as a team.

Besides, exciting stuff always seems to happen when Cloud's around.

He's just thinking that when he smells blood. It's a smell that's like nothing else in the world and it yanks at his heart as if it were a clawed hand. He recognizes the smell too. It's a smell Cloud had on him when they first met but even as he rounds the corner he knows it's not Cloud. There's something… mustier about this scent. Even when he thought he was a beast, Cloud never smelled like one. There's something unnatural about this scent, this blood he's following now, and even as he lowers his nose to the ground to follow it, the hair on his back and shoulders and around his throat is rising. The beast in him wants him to leave and whispers in his soul that whatever is ahead down the cramped alley is bad but the man in him needs to know because if it is bad, it might be a threat. He's glad he smells like trash now because it makes it harder to distinguish his own scent if the source of the bad smell is awake and aware and he creeps on silent feet deeper into the narrow confines of the brick walls and built up trash.

The blood gets thicker and he can see its trail as well as smell it now.

He sees the fur before he fully rounds the tipped over and battered metal trashcans. Its black fur but not like his. The creature in front of him is diseased and he can hear the breath rasping through its throat. It's all wrong too because – it's one of them and yet it's not. It's trapped somewhere between on its transformation and it's partially human and its partially beast. Zack's seen a lot, a lot more than he's ever told Cloud about and a lot more that he usually lets the beast make him forget, and he's only seen one of his kind trapped between in change before. It means that things have gone so wrong, that the creature is so close to death, that it can't even remember what it is anymore. The beast in him needs to run away from that because it's terrible and there's nothing it wants to do with this. The man in him needs to stay though even if he knows there's nothing he can do because its one of _his _kind and Zack can't leave it alone in its last moments. It's one of _them_ after all.

He changes because beast recognizes beast as a threat but as a man he's a little bit safer feeling to the dying creature in front of him. It's cold in the alley without any clothes to change into but at least it's a big city and people don't go checking on strange noises in big cities. He doesn't have to worry about anyone stumbling across him. He crouches down and gingerly shifts the beast so it's at least lying more comfortably. The face is a ruin of black oily fur and blood and it's got a stunted muzzle and a human's skin peeking out between torn patches of hair. He thinks it's too far gone to be aware of him but it opens eyes the color of ice and it smiles as it looks up at him. He knows it's dying and he's supposed to be comforting it but something deep in him, human and beast, shudders at what is in those eyes and that smile.

Then it opens its jaws and its tongue is raw and chewed on and its voice is oily and crawls under his skin as it asks with surprising calm:

"Cloud?"

Zack jerks back in surprise and one of the pale eyes follows the movement while the other stares at something else. Zack is quick to lean back in, though even then he's not foolish enough to leave his throat exposed, and he repeats the name back:

"Cloud?"

The jaws smile again and the teeth are rotting on one side and bone white on the other.

"My… son…" the cracked voice is pleased and for the second time Zack's eyes go wide. Then the beast in him surges forward and he can feel his own jaw trying to elongate. Because he needs to rip the throat out of the creature in front of him. Cloud has never talked about his father – except when he's screaming in his sleep.

"Tell him – " the oily voice is choking and it takes Zack, fighting the transformation, a minute to realize its because the creature in front of him is laughing. "Tell him that he can run but he can't hide. Tell him it's too late. Tell him _playtime_ is over."

Zack grabs the beast by its shoulders and his eyes are narrow. His own beast is close to the surface, sensing the threat to his friend, sensing the evil in front of its nose, and he shakes the body so hard the head lolls.

"He's free now. You're dead, you sick bastard."

The one functioning eyes swivels in its oversized socket and looks at him and it's clinical and calm. Cloud has calm eyes like that just before he does terrible things too. The stunted muzzle smiles again.

"Not me." The eye gleams with pleasure. "The silver haired hunter is coming for all of my blood. And all my blood has touched. And then all of my kind. He's finally remembered my name and what I did to him all those years ago and he's finally gone mad. Took him long enough."

The creature gives its broken coughing laugh again and Zack remembers all the time's Cloud has covered his own laughter with a cough to hide it except this is a horrible, choking sound and there's blood and foam on the muzzle. The pale eye fixes on him and the muzzle is still smiling. The voice is weakening though.

"When the silver haired hunter comes for you – remember… Hojo sent him."

Zack's beast takes over then and when he raises his head again, he's coated in fur and there's blood on his jaws. The ex-solider inside Zack is satisfied because you never leave an enemy behind but the beast is still restless because, even though it's dead now, the feeling of its threat is still in the air. Zack wants the taste out of his mouth though because it's foul and oily and he leaves what's left of the creature behind to rot, knowing that anyone that finds it will never be willing to believe what it really is. He trots out of the alley in search of water. The taste is still in his mouth and making him sick to his stomach as he saunters down the sidewalk. He wants water and his tongue burns and so does the roof of his mouth. He realizes he's drooling and he can't seem to stop it. He tries to spit but his mouth is built wrong for it in this form and when he looks around for a place to change his eyesight is blurry and it sways alarmingly. He feels the beginnings of panic then and it feels as if the oil and the fire are starting to slide their way down his throat. His beast responds before his human can and he's running in fear. He knows he needs to stop and he knows he needs water but the beast is panicked and his mind is starting to feel fuzzy. It's hard to reassert control and he's aware that his body is starting to stumble and all both the man and the beast can think is that they need to find somewhere safe to hide. He dreams of green meadows in the middle of the iron and concrete city. That's all he remembers for a very long time.

When he wakes up, he's still dreaming of meadows. His throat hurts and his tongue feels swollen and his eyes hurt when he opens them. There's green in front of him and he blinks a few times and squints at it because it looks a lot like grass except the last thing he remembers is being in a big city. Then all the rest of the memories come flooding back over him and he jerks to his feet. Or rather, he tries to jerk to his feet. All he manages is to flop gracelessly and wake up the rest of his body so it can start hurting too. He rolls his eyes at himself even though that hurts as well and his first thought is –

'How am I going to tell Cloud?'

"Hello? Hello, uh – nice dog…"

His eyes shift and the world around him spins but when it settles down again there's a girl in his line of vision and he smiles, or would if he had lips, because –

She's really pretty.

He tries to thump his tail at her because thumping his tail usually makes girls smile. Her face shifts but its only half a smile and its half pity and she comes a little bit closer. He thinks she smells good but maybe it's the grass around him that smells good, he can't tell.

"Don't bite me," she warns him sternly and he tries to look small and harmless but when she gets close he can't stop it and starts to cough. It wracks his body and sounds ferocious and evil and it pulls that horrible oily taste up in his mouth again. It leaves him weak and shaky and he's sure he's scared her away and wishes he hadn't because she makes him feel better. Then he feels hands on his shoulder and his head and he realizes that she's got his head in her lap and she's stroking his fur and murmuring silly nonsense words. It makes it easier to breath and he shuts his eyes and sighs. She laughs lightly at him.

"You poor thing," her voice is kind even though she's just laughed at him and he tries to thump his tail again to show her he really is a nice guy once you get the chance to know him. She smiles at him when he does and her hands feel good on his fur. Until she sensibly comments:

"It's probably something you ate. You've been digging through people's trash, haven't you?"

He lets out a groan to remind her that he's a 'poor thing' and she shouldn't be blaming him for dumpster diving. She laughs softly again in that nice laugh of hers and keeps stroking his fur.

"All right, all right. I'll take pity on you." She smiles softly at him and he thinks it's worth being so sick over. His beast temporarily buries why he was so sick in the first place so that he doesn't have to remember. But he does remember that he needs to find Cloud because it's important. He promises himself that he will find Cloud but first he's going to lie here in the pretty girl's lap for a little bit longer.

He falls asleep that way.

When he wakes up it's darker and he's feeling better but his ribs hurt from the coughing. His throat feels raw and he's thirsty. The pretty girl is gone and he's just in the process of staggering to his feet when she comes back in. He realizes that he really is in a field except it's not really a field but a hole in the floor of a big building where flowers have grown up. The pretty girl is carrying a bowl and she stops when she sees him on his feet. Instead of coming closer, she sets the bowl down and backs up a little. He smells water and so he tries to make himself look small and harmless. As weak as he feels it's not hard. He pads over to the bowl and the man in him pays enough attention to keep the beast in him from guzzling the water the way it wants to. He'll get sick again if he does though and so he only takes it in little laps. He raises his eyes while he does and the pretty girl is still standing where she retreated to and watching him curiously.

"You look a lot like a wolf," she tells him as he finally lifts his head from the water. He puffs out his chest a little because he's never liked being called a dog the way Cloud doesn't seem to mind. She laughs at him again and he struts a little in front of the water bowl so that she'll laugh again. She does and makes him feel proud of himself.

"You're a clever fellow, aren't you?" she asks. "It's almost like you understand what I'm saying."

Zack tips his head to the side at her and does his best to lift one ear and make the other one flop down. He's not sure if it works or not but she laughs again and then dusts off her hands on the hips of her dress.

"Well, I'm glad I met you, Mr. Wolf. I'm glad you're feeling better." She points a finger at him. "Don't dig up my flowers."

Then she's turning and it looks like she's actually going to leave him there. He doesn't want her to leave. He likes her laugh and the way she smiles at him! He bounces on his toes for a second or two as he tries to think and then he inhales deeply through his nose and starts to cough. She turns back to look at him in concern and he makes himself stagger a step or two toward her before he lets his legs collapse under him. She comes rushing back over to him and he gives her the most pitiful whine he can dredge up and raises his big blue eyes to her as if she's his only comfort in a cold, cruel world.

"Oh, you sweet thing," she's back down on her knees in front of him again and he dramatically drags himself the foot it takes to drop his chin back into her lap. He closes his eyes –

and she swats him on the back of his head.

He yelps in surprise and opens horrified eyes to stare at her even though it wasn't a hard swat. She gives him a look but she's smiling too.

"You faker," she accuses him and he lets out a heart broken sigh. She laughs again and slips her fingers over the fur on his head. He closes his eyes and relaxes a little but inside he's chuckling because she caught him and she's going to spoil him anyway. Finally she gives his head a little tap and he opens his eyes to look up at her.

"I suppose I could bring you home with me. Just for tonight," she tells him with stern eyes and he looks happily up at her. Until she adds:

"But first you need a bath. You stink."


	5. Chapter 5: Stray III

_mostly because I can't resist these two and if Zack was getting page, they demanded a bit more too._

**Stray III**

by TamLin

It's been a week since he's found her and he's never been so happy and so comfortable and so at peace. And so frustrated.

They're at the bar she works at. He would have never thought to look for her at a bar considering the way she was when they were children together but she works at a bar now and she's… she's absolutely beautiful as she does. Cloud lies in his now accustomed place where the counter of the bar breaks to let people behind it and his blue eyes follow her tirelessly. He can watch her no matter where she is from his spot and she steps over him in automatic habit as she moves from behind the bar to the small tables, mixing and serving drinks with graceful efficiency.

It's a small bar and its run by a huge giant of a man with a voice to match named Barrett. Barrett doesn't like him and calls him 'flea bag'. Barrett is also helpless when it comes to the dark haired girl that loves the 'flea bag' however and so for all his grumbling, Cloud is allowed into the 'establishment' and is soon considered a part of the furniture as much as any of the other regulars. At first they ask about him and a few of them even attempt to pat him, which he tolerates with ill concealed humor only for her, but after a while they're all comfortable enough with each other to ignore each other again and Cloud can go back to relaxing and watching his girl as she moves through the bar as if she's dancing with an invisible partner. He's used to graceful and he's used to humans and he's not used to seeing the two so seamlessly blended together. He can't get enough of watching her and even the patrons comment on it. She smiles and says he loves her and gives them their drink and they smile because she's happy and don't understand what she's really just told them.

Each night as she sleeps he lets himself wear his human body and he holds her close and drowns in the feeling.

He's never been so happy before. He's never felt so alive. His heart doesn't ache and he had forgotten what that absence of pain felt like before he found her again.

He'd also forgotten the growing, gnawing restlessness being with her embeds in his chest and stomach.

Her replacement arrives and Cloud heaves himself to his feet. He doesn't like the other woman. She smells like a different man every time she comes in and she forgets he's there and trips over him or steps on his tail. He's thought of biting her ankles to remind her. Not to break them because she's small and foolish and it would be like hurting a child but he sometimes wonders how often she can forget he's there considering she constantly trips over him. He's not sure it's entirely unintentional and he thinks, just maybe, it's because he's with the dark haired girl and for some reason that makes her angry. She goes by him now with a 'good doggie' tossed at him along with a titter that she's calling a beast of his size 'doggie'. He didn't find it funny or amusing or endearing the first time and he still doesn't now. He ignores her and trots over to where his girl is taking the money from Johnny, one of the regulars, and giving him a smile. Johnny likes her. It doesn't take a genius to figure it out and Cloud tolerates it because the guy is polite about it and looks at her face almost as much as he steals looks at her chest. He still pushes between them and gives the other man a steady look from his unnatural blue eyes before turning his attention on his girl. Her face, which wasn't harsh before, still softened when he looks at her and it makes his heart go large and warm in his chest.

He loves her, he loves her, he loves her…

She crouches down and wraps her arms around him and asks her usual question:

"Going out again, Cloud?"

He lays his head over her shoulder and closes his eyes with an exhaled sigh now that he's in her arms again and hears her quietly hum in response. She'll be on shift for another hour but she'll work behind the bar now while the other girl waits the tables. She'll be safe. Safer at least. He has errands to run.

She pulls back but strands of her midnight hair stay tangled with his golden fur and she slips a hand over his head, her thumb sinking a bit deeper to rub between his eyes the way she's just recently discovered he likes and he exhales again as she does so and she smiles.

"You'll come back?" she asks him. She asks it every time he leaves and even though it's not with the barely concealed panic it was the first time, she's still afraid he won't. He's still afraid he won't. That somehow, something will come up and he'll fail her again and she'll be alone. She needs him to be confident though when she asks that specific question with that look in her beautiful, sad dark eyes and he bumps his forehead against her shoulder the way he does every time and she laughs and gently tugs his ear so he knows its all right for him to go now. He trots to the door and stops there to look over his shoulder at her the way he always does and she's beautiful and graceful and music as she dances her way back to the bar. Johnny watches her go as well and then he stands up and walks over to the door and he holds it open for Cloud to go out first and follows him out. Cloud turns and starts to trot down the sidewalk but Johnny says:

"Hey," and Cloud turns to look back over his shoulder at the man standing in the gray city on the cracked sidewalk in front of a bar that holds the closest people he probably has to friends. The man's eyes are watching him.

"What I wouldn't do to be you," Johnny tells him and Cloud doesn't answer or turn away. For a long minute they look at each other and then the man turns and pulls his coat tighter around himself and Cloud turns and goes the other way.

He's careful to be back before his girl's shift ends and as he walks in the door he hears how quiet it is. The air crackles like electric across his fur and he feels it raising the hair on his ruff and shoulders. His eyes find her immediately and see the source of the pause.

There's a man twisted awkwardly across the bar counter and she has his wrist in one of her slender hands. It's bent oddly and it's what's got him sprawled across the bar in fact as he tries to follow it to keep it from being broken. Her eyes are still dark but now they're dark fire touched with angry humor and she's holding the man that's twice her size easily pinned with just her single hand threatening his wrist. He's watching her with surprised, white-rimmed eyes.

"See?" she asks and her voice is soft but everyone in the room hears it. "It's not nice to touch other people without permission, is it?"

"No," he shakes his head and his voice shakes too and Cloud can hear the pain in it and they all know it's not as bad as the pain can get. It's just a warning and the man is quick to add: "No, ma'am."

She lets the man go with a friendly smile that's not in her eyes and he slumps as she takes the shot glass that was in front of him away and moves to dump it in the sink. He rubs his wrist and hesitates, but Barrett is standing at the doorway where he's come out of the kitchen now and he's not joking with the meat cleaver he's picked up on his way there. There's no support for the man in the room of regulars that consider the dark haired girl one of their own either. Sweetly, from the sink and out of arm's range, she asks:

"Was there anything else before you go?"

And the guy gets the hint pretty easily and shakes his head as he leaves the bar stool and heads for the door.

"No. No, I'll go."

He pulls up short when he sees Cloud in the doorway and for a very long moment, Cloud stays where he is and just looks at the man. Finally he moves to the side and the guy flees the bar to look for a safer place to get drunk and grope women. The patrons of the bar go back to their drinks and talk and Barrett, with a scowl for the dark haired girl, goes back into the kitchen. Cloud comes up to the bar and hops up onto the stool that's near the corner and sits down to look at her sternly. She gives him the same dismissive wave that she's already given Barrett and sets down a wide rimmed glass in front of him, full of water. He snorts and she laughs at him and leans over the bar to kiss between his eyes.

"I don't care who you are. I'm not giving you alcohol."

He makes a noise in his throat but being outside has made him thirsty and so he lowers his head and politely drinks his water. She smiles triumphantly at him and goes back to cleaning the glasses and putting everything back in place so that they can leave. When she's all done she takes back his empty glass and washes it out, setting it aside for next time. Her replacement titters again and says her 'doggie' almost acts human and his dark haired girl smiles and says he's special. It makes him warm like hot oil in his chest and yet it makes him ache too and he knows he's not going to be able to keep this up for much longer.

That night while they lie in her bed and she sleeps, he holds her too tightly against him and buries his face in her throat and grinds his teeth in the back of his jaw with the need for her.

The next day when he goes out during her last hour, he only goes as far as the back alley and bag he's hidden there for the past few days. He lets his furred body slide and reclaims his human one. Then he puts on the dark clothes he's been collecting over the past week. Somehow wearing clothes makes him feel different and he takes a long moment, standing there in them, to inhale and feel the way they lie over and against his skin. It's a reassuring feeling and he catches and appreciates the way the boots he's wearing make noise as he finally walks back to the mouth of the alley. He pauses outside the familiar door of the bar and rubs at the back of his neck. He doesn't want to do this. He really doesn't. He doesn't want anything to change. He needs it to change though and he knows that he can't do this to her in the safety of her own home because that's not fair to her, to take that security and calm environment from her. It makes his eyes narrow and he pushes the door open and steps in.

He's a new face and so the regular patrons turn to glance at him curiously and then go back to their drinks and their conversations. She's at the bar and she's got her back to him while she takes something down from one of the shelves and it makes the hem of her shirt ride up and he can't seem to pull his eyes from the pale soft skin of her lower back that gets exposed. It makes him freeze where he is and he feels the heat pool in his stomach and his mouth goes dry. Under his gloves, his palms itch maddeningly and all he can think of is how good she feels each night when she's soft and warm and asleep in his arms.

"Looking for someone, stranger?"

The voice is throaty and he feels a brush up against his arm. It distracts him from his girl just as she turns with the bottle she was reaching for to laugh at one of the patrons at the bar and Cloud looks down to see the replacement girl that always trips over him. She's pressed close even though there's no crowd and her breasts brush his arm again through the fabric of their clothes as she sways. Under his blue eyes, she flutters and licks her upper lip. Cloud's nostrils flare and he can smell the scent of two different men on her skin even from where he's standing. Her fingers slip around his wrist and he sees triumph in her eyes as she gives him a little tug that brings his hand up against her.

"I'll take good care of you, handsome," she promises and his eyes half lid in response to the scent he's getting from her. His incisors aren't as sharp in this form but he can still feel the poke of one of them against his lower lip as his mouth narrows. He gives his wrist a sharp snap that twists it out of her hands and then he forgets about her as he walks to the bar.

His stool is already pushed back a little and waiting for him and he slides onto it. Her hand is already reaching for his usual glass before his dark haired girl turns her head and sees him. Her brows twitch down in confusion but she leaves the glass where it is and walks over to him, drying her hands on a dishrag. She gives him a smile but it's unsure at its edges and her brows haven't lifted from their puzzle over her dark eyes.

"Sorry, that seat's taken," she tells him and her voice is soothing to his ears. "Scoot over one and I'll get you something to drink."

He exhales a sound through his nose and raises his eyes to hers. They lock, blue and dark brown, and then he watches as her eyes slowly go wider and wider as she freezes. He's aware of the color that drains from her face and the fact she's dropped the rag in her hands but he can't look away from the darkness of her eyes. Her hands go to her heart, no, they're covering the same spot on her chest that she did the first night he found her again, and her lips part a little. He can hear a thundering in his ears and he's not sure if it's her heartbeat or his but it drowns out everything else. Barely, just barely, her head shakes in denial and just as minutely; he lowers his chin to nod in response. The bar around them has realized something's going on and falls silent. She blinks and looks away but her eyes come back to his and he's drowning in that darkness again and needing her, needing her, needing her…

She bolts then, a split second jolt that leaves the room suddenly empty of her and the door to the kitchen swinging. He looks down and his eyebrows twitch over his eyes but his face gives no other sign. Then he raises his head and looks at the rest of the bar and they go back to their previous pursuits but it's subdued and they're all watching him and that swaying kitchen door with one eye. A part of him wishes he could have been just another stranger to her, that he could have introduced himself and she could have thought they were only just meeting and fallen in love with him as the man before dealing with the reality of the wolf except she isn't stupid and he's always been proud of her for that. She'd always seen him as more than what he looks like and in a way he is glad because he's a coward and this means he doesn't have to try to explain the fur and fangs he can wear because she already knows.

He hears the back door to the bar, hidden in the kitchen, close, and his head jerks up in response from where it had sunk. He's on his feet in an instant and turning to follow except his way is barred by a huge block of dark skinned muscle and he lifts his eyes to see Barrett standing in front of him with his arms crossed over his chest and murder in his eyes. It makes the muscles in Cloud's arms and legs tighten in response to the threat and he knows he could kill the man, even in this form, except its Barrett and she likes Barrett. But the man is blocking his way and she's walking home alone and he's silently promised her that she won't have to be alone anymore. His eyes narrow down.

"Maybe you should sit back down, Spiky," Barrett tells him and it's not a suggestion and he's seconds away from broken bones when Cloud realizes…

She's sent Barrett to block him so she can run away from him.

He feels it like a blow to the chest even as the helpless puzzlement rises in him. She's left him behind and she's sent someone to make sure he stays behind. His brows twitch over his eyes again and he sits down on his stool with this new mystery and Barrett looks surprised but doesn't leave his position. Cloud rests his hands on the bar and rests his chin on top of his hands and looks at the empty wall on the other side of the bar, barely frowning as he thinks about this new development.

She ran and he's not supposed to follow. He doesn't like that but he turns it over mentally and realizes that she hasn't told him not to follow. She just sent Barrett to stop him from doing it right away. The man can't stop him forever though. So… she just wanted a head start? His brows knit and he frowns again at the empty wall.

She's buying time.

He straightens up in his chair and relaxes. He doesn't mind giving her time. He's been her dog for so long that being her man is going to take some getting used to. He doesn't mind if she runs just as long as it's not too far. He's not going to lose her again. Not now. Not ever.

Barrett finally, grumbling, goes back to the other side of the bar and tells him he's not welcome here anymore. Cloud ignores him and goes out the door.

She's long gone and he'd known she would be. Barrett thinks that he's bought her enough time and that Cloud won't be able to follow her but even if Cloud couldn't still smell her intoxicating scent lingering in the alley behind the bar where he ducks to slip out of his clothes and change back to wolf form, he already knows where she's going. He catches up the leather bag that his clothes are in with his teeth and lopes down the sidewalks he's memorized by this point. She's nowhere along the way and he stashes his bag outside and than pauses in front of her door. Her scent is strong here and so he knows she's inside and that she ran the whole way here because her smell is already starting to fade from the doorknob. He sits down in front of the door and looks at it.

He doesn't hurt, not exactly. He can feel it waiting in his chest, like a little beast made of needle sharp claws and thin teeth, waiting for its chance to tear at him again but at the moment, its only waiting. He's not hurt because he knows he has just done something confusing and terrible to her and he knows he should have handled it differently but he doesn't know how and he doesn't even know what he's supposed to do now. He can't make it better. He knows that. But he wants to somehow make it okay.

He thinks…

He thinks she might get mad at him. He doesn't want her to be angry with him but he has been lying to her since they've found each other again. He couldn't be human for her before but he's learned how to be since and he didn't tell her right away the way he should have. He knows being able to be human outside the way he always has been inside changes things between them and he's been selfish and not wanted things to change.

Except he needs them to change. Being only her dog isn't enough anymore.

It occurs to him that she might not be willing to take him as anything but her dog and it makes something in his chest twist painfully. To think that she only loves him as a dog, that she won't love him as a man. It's so painful that he exhales a low sound against it and shuts his eyes. He tells himself he's jumping too far ahead and he makes himself concentrate on how to get in the door first.

What if she doesn't open it for him? Even if he were human he wouldn't feel right about walking into her house without her opening the door for him first. Not right now. He hopes one day soon he'll be able to let himself in and know that it's all right.

Finally, he simply raises a paw and scratches at the door. It's quiet for a long time and then he hears movement and realizes that she's been sitting against the door on the inside this entire time too. It's quiet again for another long moment and he sits patiently and waits. Then he hears the locks turning and the door cracks open just enough for her to look out and down at him. He stays where he's sitting and looks up at her and for a long moment that's all. Finally she opens the door the rest of the way and he comes in. She shuts the door and locks it again and then she moves past him into the living room and sits down on the couch and turns on the television.

She's not going to talk about it and he knows he's a coward but he's relieved. He hesitates a moment more and then goes over to hop up on the couch next to her. After a cautious period of time, her arm slowly slips around his shoulders and he exhales in relief and lowers his head into her lap as he lies down. For him, for the moment, it's enough.

He gives her three days to get used to the idea and during that time he doesn't change even when she's sleeping and he doesn't go out during her last hour at the bar. He catches her looks from the corners of her eyes when she thinks he's not paying attention and the way she's starting to get self-conscious when he's watching her but he tells himself to be patient.

His patience lasts three days.

He loses the last of it in the middle of the night when she whispers his name in her sleep next to him and the sound is liquid heat and need and he almost goes mad right then and there. So he waits until she's out of bed and in the other room making breakfast that morning and then he goes into the bathroom a dog and comes out a man, dressed in the clothes he'd brought in from outside when she wasn't watching and hidden behind her towels in the cabinet. He doesn't put on the boots but he carries them and very intentionally he sets them down in front of her bed next to her own work boots. It makes him pause, as determined and angry and frustrated as he is, because it looks so odd and strange and _right _seeing his shoes next to hers. It makes him even more sure that he's done being just her dog and his steps are firm and sure as he strides out of the bedroom and into the apartment.

She's at the sink mixing something that should distract him with its delicious smell but he's too focused and she's in her work uniform. The short shirt bares her stomach and the short skirt lets her long pale legs go on forever. Her hair is back in a loose ponytail and it sways as she turns her head to look at him as he approaches. The look on her face goes from cheerfully unsuspecting to surprised to panicked in a matter of seconds but by then he's already over to her and he braces a hand against the counter top on either side of her. She smells better than anything she's making and being this close to her when she's awake is painful torture and feels better than anything he's ever felt all at the same time.

"No!" she denies him automatically and he feels the fear in her but it's not the terror of when she thought he was a beast in the alley that first night and so it doesn't break him. She's not reacting to him as a monster but as a man and he needs that. His brows come down and his eyes narrow as he tucks his chin in a nod in response and he doesn't back away from her. Instead he tightens his arms on either side of her so they trap her closer and she reacts automatically.

His blue eyes go wide as she swings at him and he jerks out of the way instinctively before he realizes that she wasn't trying to hit him as she uses his reaction to find an opening and escape him. She's faster than any deer he's ever chased and even more graceful and he suddenly wishes they were outside somewhere and he could chase her forever. Except she's almost to the bedroom and he knows instinctively that she'll lock him outside of it if she gets there first. And still, he can tell her fear isn't of him.

He catches her just outside the bedroom door and spins her to press her back against the wall. Her hands fly up and he manages to catch them, transferring both of her slender wrists into one of his long fingered hands where he can hold them. She still has her legs and she could hurt him with a well-placed knee if she really wanted but she doesn't even pretend she's going to. Instead she's shaking her head desperately at him and her hair is a storm of liquid darkness around her. He's surprised to see tears in the edges of her eyes.

"Cloud – " she knows him in any form and her voice on his name is heaven to him. "Not now. Please…" She's pleading and her eyes are liquid but he can't – he can't –

In response, he steps closer to her and her body is against his, pressed there by the wall and it makes his breath catch in his throat. She's still fighting him but it's desperately, not fiercely. She's scared of what he's doing – of what he's doing to them – but she's not scared of him and he can bear any other type of fear in her.

"Please… Cloud. This changes everything…"

"Yes," he finds his voice and it comes out rough from disuse and she stops fighting him at the sound of it but the fear is still on her skin and he doesn't let go of her wrists. Her eyes are full of tears now but they still don't fall.

"I want more time," she tells him and its finally fierce even through the liquid in her voice. "If you're human things have to change and I'm not ready yet. You won't be able to come to work with me and I won't be able to touch you whenever I want and we won't be able to sleep together anymore."

And – finally - he understands. He remembers all the rules she's put in place around herself and the way she acted around men when they'd both been younger and the boys had started paying attention to her. All the things she'd done, and still does at the bar, to keep them 'safe' from falling in love with her. It makes the edges of his lips turn upward because she's looking at him as a man, a human man, and she thinks that changes everything between them according to her rules.

It also tells him that she loved him, because she still wants to be able to touch him and be near him and yet, her rules say, if he is human, she has to stop.

So she won't 'lead him on'?

Except… he's already been following her. From the very first time she touched him and reminded him what being human was.

"I'm not giving up my place in your bed," it comes out gruffer than he's meant it to and her eyes fly wide to meet his. She's beautiful that way and he feels another smile, barely there, on his lips. He's made his intentions to her very clear and he feels the way her breathing hitches and goes unsteady but there's no smell of fear in her at all now and it make his chest swell.

"Cloud – " his name catches in her throat and comes out weak and it rouses his need to protect her as well as his hunger for her. He needs to hear her say his name that way again and again. For the rest of their lives. He lowers his head to hers and her name rumbles softly out of him in response.

"Tifa…"

He feels her go weak against him then and her exhales flutter against his face, unsteady and shaking. It makes his heart and his body ache but they're good aches and he lowers his head a bit more so that he can nuzzle against her throat. She makes a little noise when he does and it encourages him. He lets go of her wrists and her arms slip down to twine around his shoulders. He runs his tongue over the warm skin of her throat and her fingers and arms clutch at him as he feels her knees give way. It makes him rumble a laugh, deeply content inside his chest, and he wraps both arms around her and finally – finally – lets himself take his time tasting her the way he's been longing to since he found her again. She makes weak, innocent sounds of pleasure that only encourage him and her nails move against the back of his shirt. She's his, finally his, and she's always been his and he lets his mouth trail upward to find hers and she's waiting for him and welcoming and he's home, finally, finally home. His hands are moving over her and somehow his shirt ends up on the floor and her fingers are in his hair and moving over his back and there's her, only her, always her. He lifts her and she wraps those wonderful pale legs around his waist and that's all the answer he needs as he drowns in her scent and her heat and her taste and the way she says his name over and over and over again as if it's the only thing she knows. And he already knows…

She won't be going to work today.


	6. Chapter 6: Taken Away

_Sooo - while I was__ watching my Advent Children the other day - why could I not live in Japan so that I would already have the extended version?! - something the director said caught my attention. To me it was the _ping!_ moment when the light came on and I got Cloud just a little bit more than I had before. Here's what came out of it. ps - the inner monologue to his inner monologue is Biskitty's fault. One of her _Those Who Fight _chapters had a character doing it and I thought - dang, that's so Cloud too! This is set just before AC in the timeline.  
_

**Taken Away**

by TamLin

He was happy.

It scared the hell out of him.

_don't trust it…_

He didn't get 'happy' often in his life. Bursts, rays, brilliant engulfing beams of it – yes. Continual, steady, reliable happiness… no.

_hell no…_

But here it was, threatening him with its – with its –

Its mundanity.

It had started when he reached the beginning of Edge.

_no… no, before that…_

It had started when he finally turned Fenrir toward Edge.

_no… before that…_

It had started that morning when he'd woken up before the sun, still in the dark, and smelled coffee and known she… _Tifa_… she was already awake and waiting in the kitchen for him. He had known that he would check on the sleeping children and then go down to her and sit and listen to her talk and tease and send him out the door with food he always forgot to eat.

Happy. He'd woken up happy.

_damn it all…_

The warm, quiet pleasure had faded on the way out the door but not by much. Fenrir was waiting for him and he was still warm with coffee and her goodbye hug. It had stayed with him like a worm in his stomach all day as his customers had been grateful -

_too grateful. I'm not a hero anymore. Gave that up. never really was…_

For their packages and letters. Then the warmth had woken and grown when he'd turned Fenrir home…

_home. She's always meant home…_

Home to the children and her… _Tifa_…. The entire drive back it had wiggled in his stomach and when he'd reached Edge it had worked its way upward until it was threatening his heart as he'd seen –

_Heaven_

Seventh Heaven come into view. He had walked in the door and heard the children…

_up too late… past their bedtime… so glad…_

Heard the children call his name and both of them – both of them – had come rushing over to latch on to him.

_Marlene…she's not scared of me anymore…_

Marlene had wrapped around his waist. Denzel, shyer, more reserved, eyes in his heart, heart in his eyes, had managed to restrain himself and only clutch at Cloud's hand with both of his. He'd ruffled their hair, squeezed Marlene's shoulder, lifted Denzel easily off the floor with just one arm while the boy beamed with pleasure and held on like life…

_love…_

To his grip. The warmth, the worm in his heart, had struggled upward into his throat and threatened to choke him…

_The way it does every night…_

And then she'd said 'welcome home' as she came out of the kitchen…

_beautiful… she gets more beautiful every day… every time I see her…how can she be so beautiful and still smile at me that way…_

He'd wanted her wrapped around him too, the way the children were, but he couldn't ask. Could never ask. Couldn't even dare show it for fear…

_Break… everything will break… idiot for wanting… stop thinking it…_

But she'd known anyway and she'd come over with that smile…

_**mine**__… that's my smile… I'm the only one she smiles at that way…_

And wrapped her arms around him and it had been…

_heaven… his very own Promised Land...  
_

She made everything heaven. Haven. Home. Marlene had giggled and he'd lowered his head, just his head –

_idiot_

And shut his eyes and exhaled as he felt the soft skin of her shoulder against his chin and she'd laughed so quiet and soft and stroked her fingers through his hair gently. Tender like a mother, familiar and relaxed with the motion like a best friend, sending pleasure down his back and shoulders like a -

_like a sweetheart…_

The worm in his throat had wrapped around his heart and his stomach as well

_how did it grow so much every day…_

And it had squeezed. It made him lift his free hand and gently, carefully, wrap his fingers around her delicate ribs. Made him think of how good it would feel if he'd take her in his arms the way he let himself sometimes.

_idiot_

Made him think of how nice it would be to never have to let go.

She'd saved him, the way she did every night, stepping back with her lips brushing his cheek and his head had turned the way it did every night so his lips were there when her cheek drew back and he could feel her skin brush against them for a brief moment. The worm in charge of his entire chest and throat and stomach and head and the dry tight place behind his eyes had started to pulse like a heart beat the way it always did and he'd let her go and the children had dragged him over to the table to show him what they'd done that day.

_even though it's past their bedtime… so glad…_

She'd brought him dinner and then watched to make sure he ate, sitting across the table from him and smiling their shared, secret smile over the children and their big – BIG – events of the day.

_how did she always know when he'd forgotten to stop for lunch…_

It had been warm and perfect and quiet and content. No large explosions of bliss, no thundering drums of joy, no breathless squeeze of heart numbing pleasure – just… quiet, content, stable, peace and happiness to simply exist in the bubble of life and liveliness he found himself in.

Insidious because it promised it would always be just this way for him. That he would always be allowed to come back to it.

Again and again.

Year after year.

On nights like that, he felt the traitorous shaft of hope in his chest when he looked at Denzel. That, maybe, they could win again. That, maybe tomorrow, the cure for the black bruise on the boy's forehead and the hidden ones on his thin, little chest would come. He'd find it, or one of his contacts would, or a total stranger would but - someone would and Denzel would be able to wake up each morning without pain or fear. That, maybe, this time, everything would work out.

_hate that…_

_love that…_

_idiot…_

Life didn't work that way. Not for anyone and particularly not for him. You only got so many lucky breaks and they'd used up all of theirs two years ago.

A moment too late, too soon…

An unobservant guard…

_a dropped key…_

Cloud Strife didn't trust luck for the same reason he didn't trust happiness. He'd had that. He'd been there. And it had always been taken away.

His childhood hadn't been happy. It hadn't been bad, but it hadn't been happy. He'd learned to recognize and appreciate the rays of joy when they came. The late night sound of the piano next door through his open bedroom window. The smell of his mother's turnovers. The bite of the cold, clean air on the mountain and the same bite in the water of its streams.

He'd gone to Shinra.

_The best worse decision I've ever made_

And he hadn't been happy there either. He hadn't been unhappy. He'd enjoyed the moments of pleasure. Laughing with his squad mates. A letter from home. The secret satisfaction when the other guys talked about their girls and he'd remembered the one he hoped would one day be his. Zack…

Zack…

His first experience with easy happiness that stayed around and didn't leave. His first best friend. The first time he'd realized he hadn't been happy all the time before and realized how nice it was to be that way now.

_idiot_

_naïve idiot_

He'd… failed that. Failed his friend. Been too weak, too slow

too late

Even now he didn't remember it completely and some nights it almost drove him mad, twisting around inside his head. He only had fragmented bits and pieces of that nightmare in his memory even now. Flashes of faces or voices, jarring movement, green haze over his vision making him sick to his stomach. Certain shades of green still made him sick to his stomach…

He'd been too weak though, even with his mako-infused body. Too weak in his mind. He'd been too weak and Zack had died and Cloud had shattered and –

And **not** even _remembered_ it!

He'd forgotten his best friend and, on a more forgivable level, he'd forgotten what being regularly happy had felt like and so… when he'd found consistent happiness again… he hadn't thought to guard against it. He'd let it in and accepted it.

_naïve_

He'd been regularly happy with Aeris. So consistently happy that he'd thought it was love. She hadn't asked past who he thought he was, hadn't – until the very end – looked deeper than what he showed her, had laughed and not been demanding and she'd…

She'd reminded him of Zack.

Not in personality but in the simple acceptance and the easy friendship. She'd wanted more than friendship but it had still come with the offer of friendship and there had been no sense of failure that had lurked in him whenever he was with Tifa those first few weeks.

his failure… at the time, he just hadn't remembered that he'd failed her…

He hadn't had to think with Aeris and that had made him happy. He'd been happy.

He'd made promises he should have known, if he'd only remembered, that he'd broken already before and would never be able to keep now…

He'd been happy and then it had been taken away from him again. And this time he hadn't forgotten and he'd felt the ache of…

Of not being happy.

It made him sound like such a self-centered bastard. Who was he to worry about whether he was happy or not? Who was he to miss it when he wasn't happy anymore? After everything everyone else had been through, everything that had been lost – what kind of absolute ass thought him not being happy was important?

_it's not…_

_I still know when I'm happy and when I'm not…_

He'd lost being happy again – and so much more.

So much more…

And, again, it had been because he wasn't strong enough. Mentally. He had been too late. Again.

_again_

_again_

_all over again_

_still_

He'd been too late, too weak, and he'd let someone he cared about die. Again. His sins were his failures… his weaknesses… their deaths. His fault. Every single time… the deaths were his fault. People he'd loved had suffered because they'd counted on him and he'd been too weak and too late to save them.

He loved Tifa and the children.

_**Gaia**__… how he loved Tifa and the children…_

So much worse and stronger and more painful and wonderful and ruthless than he'd ever loved anyone or anything before. The worm in his chest that grew each day threatened to strangle him sometimes and when he was away from them for more than a day it ate little pieces out of his heart to keep itself alive. His family…

_my family…_

He'd never been so desperate to protect anything in his life before. It seemed so small and fragile and vulnerable. His family, _**his**_ family… and an entire world that could destroy it in a thousand different ways. Death lurking like a specter over Denzel's shoulder every day, and he'd already watched one little girl sliced open by a madman for being brave and beautiful and foolish. Marlene was Barret's daughter to the core, but she was Tifa's as well and sometimes even… sometimes…

_she gets her steely-eyed glare from me…_

_shouldn't be proud of that…_

Even Tifa –

_especially Tifa…_

How much of her luck had she already used up in their quest to stop Sephiroth? How many more lucky breaks could one human possibly have left to them before Fate decided enough was enough? They'd, both of them, already used up the last of their luck. There wouldn't be any more breaks coming. He knew it. And it terrified him. Because Tifa was still brave and beautiful and foolish when it came to defending the ones she loved.

_and I lo- I lov- damn it, I'll break if I admit it…_

_or she'll break… I'll break her…_

So many horrible things in the world and Cloud knew he hadn't even seen them all. So much that could irreplaceably damage or destroy his family. Sometimes… Sometimes, despite the pain in his heart, he found himself stalling going home. Because... some nights, for no reason at all, he was afraid to go home. Afraid that he'd walk in the door and they'd all be dead.

That he would have, again, been too late –

Shit. He sounded like such a head-case.

Just because some nights, randomly, for again no reason, he'd wake up choking in the dark with his cheeks wet with tears he didn't remember giving away and visions of swords through the stomachs of the children or bullet holes leaking a raining river from Tifa –

He'd wake up and need to – _need to_ – walk that little distance across the hall.

_Don't run. It'll wake Tifa up if you run._

Walk across the hall and open the doors with hands that weren't steady just to look at them. Sometimes –

_memories of blood trails on the floor… of the way burning bodies smelled as a village went up in flames… _

_screams heard through the glass of a test tube…_

Sometimes he had to physically walk into the rooms. Touch them. Watch them breath. He'd woken Tifa up several nights ago, standing by the window in the dark of a moonless night just watching her breath. She'd almost kicked his legs out from under him before she'd realized who he was. Then she'd thrown a pillow at him and told him to come to bed.

_how did she always know…_

He'd slept in her arms that night, wrapped in the soft warmth of her bed and her body, and even though it had been chaste it had been the most intimate moment of his entire life so far.

_want to do that every night._

_don't want the clothes in the way next time…_

_Idiot._

_There's not supposed to be a next time._

...._  
_

…_want a next time…_

The more he loved his family, the deeper in love with them he fell…

The more frightened he became.

Because he'd been happy this way before and it had destroyed him when he'd had it taken away from him. And he hadn't been nearly as happy, as consistently, consumingly happy as he was now. Twice before –

No… more than twice…

Many times more than twice…

Many times before he'd failed. Failed when it really mattered, when he, if he _was_ a hero, should have been unable to fail – he'd failed and it had utterly ruined the lives of the people he'd been meant to protect. It had utterly shattered him. When it counted most – when it mattered most to him… _him_. Not the universe or the planet or all things good and kind but him personally, Cloud Strife, **him**… When it mattered most to him, he always failed. It was his one consistent. He was always too late and he was always too weak. Always.

And so his mother died.

And Zack died.

And Aeris died.

And… who died next…?

Who was left for him to fail but this? His family? His precious, impossible, misfit, patchwork, loved and adored, impossibly necessary family?

What was left to be taken from him but them?

It terrified him. Terrified him as if he was a small child. Terrified him deep in his bones, right at the core of his heart. He'd been happy before. He'd loved and been loved before. And he'd had it taken away.

Another consistent in his life.

His body had been turned into a living weapon. Twisted and warped and put back together. Filled so full of chemicals and magic and mako that he shouldn't even have a soul inside it anymore. It should be strong enough, after all that had been paid for it, to protect the ones that mattered most to him.

It never had been.

He was always too late.

He was always too weak.

What he loved was always taken away from him and he was too weak and too slow to stop it.

It had taken the thick black pus leaking from what he'd thought was only a bruise to freeze him on his way to the shower the next morning.

Because, despite everything he'd been through –

It had never once occurred to Cloud Strife that, this time, he would be the one taken away from them.


	7. Chapter 7: Taking Care

_This is for a prompt in a LJ group that Tae's got running. It asked for some interaction between a young Tifa and Cloud during the Crisis Core timeline in Nibelheim (pre-disaster)._ _ I'd been playing with the idea of wanting to do something during that time for a bit and just had to try my hand at the prompt. Here's what came out. Its from a familar moment to anyone that's played either CC or FFVII I believe. Tifa has guided the Shinra party consisting of two SOLDIERs and one Shinra grunt up Mount Nibel near her home because the mako reactor there is broken. Once to the reactor however, Sephiroth tells her that only Shinra personal are allowed inside the reactor and orders the foot soldier to stay behind with her while he and Zack enter the reactor. Do I have to tell anyone who the grunt hiding behind the helmet that's left behind to keep Tifa out of the reactor is? And - ps. anyone that wants to write this from Cloud's POV feel free. I had fun with it. _

**Taking Care**

by TamLin

_"You'd better take really good care of me then!"_

She wasn't sure why she'd said it or where it had come from but it had burst out of her in a sudden fit of anger and defiance. Now she kept her back to the man she'd said it to, and the reason she'd said it, and stared out over the mountain range. The nerve, the absolute nerve! Shinra secrets her a –

Her ass! There, she'd said it. At least in her head. 'Ladies' weren't supposed to curse and so cursing, even if it was in her head, made her feel a little better. She folded her arms in front of her and looked out at the sky that always seemed so much further away and yet closer to her this high up in the mountains. It calmed her down a little, so big and endless and empty blue. It always calmed her down, looking at the sky but especially when it was the brilliant, clear blue that she'd heard you only saw in the mountains. It always made her feel safest. She pulled in a lungful of the sharp, cold air and that helped too. She wasn't good at staying mad. She always spent so much energy in the first burst. That – and she always felt guilty for being mean. She didn't like the thought of herself as a mean person.

It was just – it was just those men. Those… Shinra people! She sighed and kicked at the rocky ground with a boot absently, looking down without seeing. All of the sudden she felt hollow inside her chest and she knew why. She wasn't usually this emotional. Cheerful and positive and helpful, sure, but… but she'd almost cried yesterday. She never cried. Not since – not since she was a little kid. And yet when she'd seen the entire collection of people Shinra had sent to her town yesterday, she'd almost cried.

Stupid. That's what she was. Just… stupid.

The already scuffed toe of her boot kicked almost gently at the rocky ground.

She'd told herself not to get her hopes up but she'd been so sure! Wasn't that the way stories went? It had made so much sense that she'd been… she'd been sure one of the SOLDIERs would be –

Would be him…

Her eyes hurt a little and she blinked them. There she went again. What was wrong with her…? She was almost sixteen for goodness sake. That was an adult. Almost… Close enough that she should know better at least. Life wasn't like the stories, no matter how much you thought it should be.

If life was like the stories, he would have written a letter to her at least once since he'd been gone.

Damn it…

The second mental curse made her smile a little at herself. She really was being stupid but the forbidden cursing helped. She guessed she was just tired of waiting. Earlier this week, she'd gone to the shop to pick up her groceries for the week for her and her dad and – and Mr. Green had already had them all set aside for her. Everything that had been on her list and he'd been so proud of himself and she'd laughed and told him how pleased she was and paid him and –

And gone home and spent the next hour beating the literal stuffing and sawdust out of the punching bag her father made her hide in the unused guest room.

Really? Was her life really so predictable? Did nothing ever change for her to the point that she even bought the same stuff over and over and over again? When had her life stopped being hers and become a routine that anyone could have lived? But what had scared her deep inside was…

What if it stayed that way?

What if she lived the rest of her life the same way it was now and nothing ever changed?

That was the low point of the story and then, like any good story, the very next day her father had announced that Shinra was sending someone from SOLDIER to look at the broken mako reactor at the top of Mount Nibel. And she'd known – oh, she'd just known how the story was supposed to go.

Except it didn't.

And here she was angry and hurt because her story had betrayed her even though she knew, she really did, that there was no story. It was just her life and it didn't work according to storybook rules.

And she'd just acted like a spoiled brat to some guy that was just doing his job.

Now she felt stupid and guilty too. She took off her hat and shook her head. Vain enough to not want 'hat hair' even when she was feeling stupid and guilty. That thought made her feel a little bit better. If she couldn't laugh at herself, she probably would go nuts. She was supposed to be their guide on the mountain and instead she was acting like a kid. Twisting the brim of her hat between her fingers she turned around and looked over at the guard standing in front of the steps that led up to the mako reactor. He was doing his best impression of a blank wall and Tifa though he was pretty good at it. He was turned just a little toward her and the mountain path but Tifa couldn't see any of his face except for his nose and cheeks and for all she knew he might be sleeping standing up. She'd heard that soldiers could do that sometimes.

Feeling a bit nervous, she moved back over to him, steps a little hesitant. He probably thought she was some spoiled kid. It made her feel embarrassed but she was determined. She'd been mean and unfair and it wasn't right to not apologize for that.

"I – um – I," she drew in a breath to get her courage together and he suddenly took a step back. It was just a little step, a barely there step, but he did step back. It made her stop moving and she shut her mouth, brows coming down. Had he… had he just stepped _back_ from her?

Was he that disgusted with her or was he angry that she'd been angry or… or was he afraid she was going to be mean again?

"I didn't – " she reached out her hand this time when she took another step forward and he really did backpedal then. Not too far. Just enough to keep him out of arm's range of her. She stopped, hurt. She wasn't used to people not wanting to be physically around her. Heck, most of the men past the age of eleven made excuses to be near her. She folded her arms over her stomach and looked at the guard in front of her. She couldn't see his face and that made it hard for her to tell why he was avoiding her. Was he mad at her? Or had she really been that mean?

She didn't want him to think she was mean.

"I just wanted to say I was sorry," she told him, determined that he wouldn't think everyone in Nibelheim was a jerk just because she'd snapped at him. "I know it's not your fault we're out here. I – I didn't mean to be so – mean."

What a great vocabulary she had. Now he was probably putting 'uneducated' next to 'mean' on his list of things to remember about people from her town. He didn't answer though but she'd kind of gotten used to him not talking. She didn't think he'd said anything the entire time she'd been around him and she thought maybe he was a mute. He nodded at her though. Did that mean he thought she'd been mean or that he accepted her apology? She shifted uncomfortably and he automatically jerked back the littlest bit.

It was getting annoying and she put her hands on her hips and glared at him.

"I'm not really all that horrible, you know," she protested and then almost smacked herself because she was sounding mean again. This wasn't working at all. She was supposed to be leaving a good impression of her town, of herself, and so far she wasn't doing that at all. She already knew she'd be awake in bed all night feeling bad for this. She had to save things somehow… had to make things better…

The sudden thought made her smile and she felt the glint of mischief.

"You know," she took another step toward him, hands behind her back, and he shifted on his heels but refused to back up. She pressed her lips down to keep from smiling. "With you backing up like that, it makes me feel pretty unwanted. Maybe I should just go find the others."

Her eyes flicked up to where his must be under the cover of his helmet for just a split second in direct challenge – and then she turned and sprinted up the stairs toward the mako reactor all his backing up had left wide open for her.

He caught her on the third step, one of his gloved hands closing around her arm, and she turned back into him laughing. She hadn't really been going to burst into the reactor or get him in trouble. She'd known he'd catch her.

"See?" she grinned at him. "You don't burst into flame if you get too close to me."

She heard a soft little sound from him and it might have been a stifled, almost painful sounding laugh.

"I really am sorry," she told him earnestly. Looking up for eyes she couldn't see under the visor of his helmet. "I didn't mean to sound angry at you."

The helmet barely moved in a shake and the lips she could only catch the hint of under his scarf weren't sharp and angry looking.

"I'm sorry you got stuck out here with me."

The helmet moved again, another almost not there movement, and this time it was a little more complex than a shake of his head but she thought it meant the same thing. He was… he was awfully close for a guy that hadn't wanted to breath the same air she was only moments ago…

She realized it at about the same time she realized she could smell him. Leather and soap and laundry detergent and under that was something that smelled like… it smelled a bit like mountain air, all sharp and clean and fierce. She realized she had her hand on his arm just below his shoulder and that her body was partially twisted to face into his.

It didn't…. it didn't feel bad… and that kind of surprised her.

He let her go and stepped back just as she was starting to think that but it wasn't a jarring move or sharp or angry. His helmet turned as he looked down and away and that helped her a little bit. Maybe he wasn't angry at her. Maybe he was just shy.

She remembered shy. She remembered all the things she'd had two years to wish she'd done in response to shy.

He didn't leave the stair he was on and she didn't want him to think she'd really meant to get him in trouble so she went back down two steps and sat down on the last one.

"You can come sit down," she offered, patting the spot next to her. He hesitated on the stair and she gave him a hopeful smile. She'd blown it big time two years ago and she didn't know if she'd ever had the chance to try again. But… maybe she could start this way with a stranger and by the time she saw the one she really wanted to see again, she'd be good enough to draw him out of his shell and his silence and –

and whatever came after that. She couldn't seem to think farther ahead than that.

Slow, he came down the steps. She expected him to sit down as far from her as possible but he apparently decided to take her hand gestures as a direct indication and, after a moment of standing above her, he finally, almost decisively, sat down right next to her.

She gave him a smile in response and he seemed to relax. Just a little. She wrapped her hands around her knees and looked down the path that led to the steps. After a minute of the silence, she softly said:

"You have, you know? Taken good care of me." A little bashful, she turned her face to look at him and saw he was looking down the path as well. That made it easier because it was a little awkward saying what she wanted to but she'd been raised that you paid what you owed and she owed him this. "Coming up here? Those monsters? I didn't even get a chance to fight any of them, you were always there first. I know you think I'm just a girl and I can't fight but I can. I come up here all the time." Next to her, his shoulders stiffened but she ignored it. "It's not that I'm not used to taking care of myself, it was just…" she stumbled suddenly over the words as she realized she was talking to a total stranger. She wasn't supposed to share the way she really was inside with strangers. Even her father didn't know who she really was inside anymore. She looked down at her knees. "It was nice of you to watch out for me, that's all. So thank you."

It was quiet for a minute and then he made a soft sound. A negation maybe or maybe it was just a 'you're welcome'. It didn't sound like a 'please stop talking' noise though and that made her brave enough to steal a look at him from the edges of her eyes.

His cheeks were pink.

Was he…? Was he blushing? For some impossible reason it made her grin and when she did, his cheeks went even redder and he turned his head away from her to look at the side of the mountain. Really? He was embarrassed she'd noticed he was always there whenever she got threatened coming up the mountain? It was so –

It made her heart feel warm and soft and ache, just a little…

"Let me see your hand," she instructed and he looked at her in surprise. She held out both of hers.

"Come on. Your hand. The one that hurts. I saw you block that monster's snout with your palm when he almost bit you. I've had to do that before too. I know their noses are like rocks and it really hurts when they smack into you that way. I can make it better. Give me your hand."

He shifted away from her, just a little, but she also saw the way the hand in question opened a little and the fingers, barely, shifted toward her. She took that as her invitation and reached out to grab it, scooting closer as she did so that their legs pressed against each others on the outside where they were sitting next to each other. He made a quiet noise when she did and froze and so she could pull his hand over into her lap. He went very still and very silent next to her and she ignored it and competently stripped off his glove.

He had nice hands.

Tifa noticed hands, mostly because she used hers so much when she fought. Master Zangan had gnarled, hard hands. Her father had long, soft hands. The blacksmith had pitted, thick hands. The hand in her lap was long too, with nice long fingers and pale skin. There were some scars on the knuckles already and Tifa knew you got those from fist fighting. The nails were short too and there were calluses in spots on the inside of his palms and the edges of his fingers which meant he didn't wear gloves all the time when he worked. Now that she'd trapped it, his hand lay loose in both of hers and he didn't try to jerk it away. She was aware that he'd leaned and his other arm was braced on the step behind her now, his shoulder behind hers. She thought… she thought if she lifted her head too much their faces would touch…

"See?" her voice came out softer than she was used to and she gently turned his hand over so it was palm up again. "I knew you'd hurt yourself."

The heel of his hand had the beginning discoloration of a bruise forming and she, for no reason she could sanely think of, traced her thumbnail lightly down the inside of his palm. She could hear his quiet inhale and the air suddenly felt a little bit thick and heavy in her lungs.

He smelled so good.

And warm…

She shut her eyes in a quick burst of annoyance at herself and shook her head a little. What was wrong with her? She just wanted to help him. That black haired SOLDIER said being helpful seemed to be a Nibelheim trait when she'd offered to guide him up the mountain, though how the guy could figure that out from just Tifa, she didn't know. Puzzling over something that trivial and pointless helped though and so Tifa started to slowly work at kneading the muscles in the soldier's hand. Her brows came down in concentration as she worked at it.

Sometimes, after practice, her hands would hurt too and Master Zangan had shown her how to massage them to loosen them up again and help the stiffness and pain go away. Tifa had gotten good at it and she had long, strong fingers so sometimes he even let her work on his hands. The soldier's hand that she was working gently on now wasn't half as horn hard and thick as Master Zangan's but it was a strong hand. Good hands, the women in the village would say. The thought made Tifa smile as she rubbed her thumbs slowly in circles over the edges of his palm and then turned his hand over to work the same circles over each joint of each finger. He made a low sound next to her and she smiled again because she knew it felt good. She always liked it when Master Zangan had used to do it to hers, even if his massage had always been just a little rough and impersonal. She couldn't keep this impersonal though because she owed the guy next to her both an apology and a thank you and since he wouldn't take either, she thought she'd give it to him this way instead. That… and if she wasn't paying attention… she could almost pretend it was someone else she was taking care of. Someone who'd broken her heart by not being right where the soldier was right now. And so she tried to tell that other someone that it was all right and she knew it wasn't his fault he wasn't here as she spread the soldier's fingers and massaged between the long digits.

It was no one's fault she'd gotten her hopes up but her own.

She worked in silence and he obviously wasn't the talkative type but it wasn't bad. It was warm and comfortable and Tifa found herself smiling softly. She always felt best when she was making someone else feel good. Finally, she was done though, even if she had stalled, and she lifted his fingers to her lips and lightly blew on the tips of them. She couldn't turn her head much because his was so close to her but she did, just a little, to look at him.

"Master Zangan says that's for luck," she told him and under the cover of his helmet's shadows, his lips smiled a little. For a very long moment more they stayed that way and Tifa thought how –

how wonderful it felt.

As soon as she caught the thought she felt nervous though. She wasn't used to feeling comfortable around men. Not since she'd hit puberty and they'd all decided her eyes were a lot lower on her body than they were. He wasn't looking at her chest but she was still suddenly aware of how close together they were and how… strange that made her feel. So she laughed weakly and looked away and gave his hand back to him very specifically.

"There. Now it won't be stiff in the morning," she told him brightly and scooted over to stand up. He caught her hand and it jerked something funny in her chest. She froze and looked down at him with wide eyes.

She never found out what he would have done. There was the sharp smell of bitter metal in the air and suddenly on her tongue and a flare of raw materia power. Tifa's eyes went huge and horrified as a ring of light and symbols appeared on the ground in front of her and a monster larger than anything she'd ever seen before clawed its way up out of that circle like a nightmare clawing its way out of a child's closet. Up the trail behind it came men in uniforms she didn't recognize. They hadn't come with the Shinra people though. Tifa was used to random wild monsters but this was like nothing she'd ever seen before. And then her eyes widened in even more horror as the air suddenly lit with the scent of ozone and the monster in the fading circle sent a bolt of light slicing toward her.

'You'd better take really good care of me', she'd said not so long ago. Faster than even she could move, the soldier was suddenly in the way of that arching light. He cried out when it hit him and it was a young sound. He didn't fall but the blood from his chest did and then the monster and those strange soldiers were on them and she wished she'd never said the words in the first place.

Some promises are spoken out loud and some are silent. Words aren't the only way to tell someone how you feel. Tifa learned both of those truths that day.


	8. Chapter 8: First Steps

_it's Tifa's birthday - fictionally at least. So here's a 'happy birthday, Tifa' gift. And also, coincidentally enough, the answer to a prompt from Tae's LJ community asking for some 'Tifa gets hurt, hides it and Cloud finds out - gametime' fic._

**First Steps**

by TamLin

It was dark and she felt rain on her back. Except it was warm rain and she'd never felt warm rain before. She had her eyes closed but she didn't want to open them. The warm rain trickled down to flow in a stream down the canyon of her chest and she suddenly realized it wasn't rain. It was blood.

Her blood.

She jerked upright with a gasp, covering her chest with her arms and then coughed, twitching away in surprise from the water that fell on her face. Warm water.

Porcelain under her.

Shower.

Oh!

oh, yes…

She was in a shower at an inn.

She muffled her tired laughter at herself and struggled to get off of her knees where she'd been resting under the hot water when she'd fallen asleep. Her hair was hanging across her like black satin ribbons and clung to her skin as she moved. It was a good thing she'd been using the shower and not the tub, she thought with wry tiredness. She could just see it now:

'Tifa Lockhart: dead at 20. Someone really should have reminded her to pull the plug before she fell asleep.'

Cloud would have found it amusing.

Maybe.

Her leg twitched a little bit under her as she stood up and she looked down to see a nasty looking gash down the outside of her thigh. She'd lost track of where she'd picked it up or which monster it had been that had given her that particular wound. They'd been fighting so many monsters since they'd gotten out of Midgar. She'd thought she was in shape but hiking halfway across the continent and running into creatures she'd never even seen before but that all seemed intent on eating them was taking its toll on her. She'd pull it together in a couple of days once her body adjusted to the difference, she knew that, but in the meantime she was going to be a little sore and a little banged up. Gingerly, she touched the area around the gash and tried to get a good look at the damage without getting _too_ good of a look.

She couldn't stand the sight of cut skin.

Bruised, broken, torn… sure. Give her broken bones and dislocated joints over the simple sight of skin that had been cleanly sliced open. She couldn't even cook poultry because the pink flesh parted too easily under her kitchen knife and looked too… It just looked too. Her hand rubbed firmly between her breasts at the runched scar tissue there and she frowned unconsciously to herself before she reached out and turned off the water.

They were supposed to be meeting the others here, in Kalm. They needed to decide what to do next, where to go. She felt so adrift. Sector Seven had been dirty and small and crowded and not always safe… but it had taken her in when she'd needed it the most. It had become her home over the years. Now she'd lost it. Again… she'd lost her home, her entire world, again.

_almost…_

It was a traitorous whisper and she shook her head at it. The violent movement almost made her lose her balance and she reminded herself she was tired and shouldn't be making quick movements on slippery surfaces. Especially naked. The last thing she wanted was one of the guys having to rush in here to save her from a cracked head while she was naked. The thought made her smile wryly as she carefully dried herself off. Fully aware that most men would jump at the chance – and that her two companions on this journey would react with shock and horror instead. Barrett was under the impression that she was his little girl and Cloud –

Cloud…

The one part of her world that always survived even when she didn't think it had. The one part of _home_ that kept coming back to her.

Even if he didn't mean to.

or necessarily even want to…

She pulled on her only other pair of clean clothes and started brushing out her hair. Everything she owned in the world was in the little backpack sitting on the closed toilet lid. It reminded her, again, of the fact this wasn't the first time she'd been homeless. With a grunt more at the way it made her muscles twitch than at the light weight of it, she hefted the backpack over her shoulder and got ready to go out and find where the others had gotten off to. She didn't have to think about the past or what she'd lost when there were other people around for her to worry over instead.

Between Barrett's emotionalism and Cloud's complete lack of the same, Tifa had plenty to distract her from her own worries and fears and heartaches.

Something tickled at her leg and she jumped thinking it was a bug. It was only a stream of blood though, bright and red, and she watched it in calm fascination as it finished its journey down her pale leg and made a little spot of red on the tile. More drops, like little birds following their mother, followed that first red path down and Tifa shook her head at herself and reached for the towel to wipe it away. It was that cut on her leg she didn't want to look at too closely. She pressed the towel to it and looked around.

It wasn't bad. It wasn't as if she was bleeding to death or anything. Now that she had pressure on it, it hurt but so did the rest of her with dozens of tired aches and sharp little pains. It certainly wasn't going to kill her. She should find one of the guys and have them fix it with materia or something. Except… she didn't want to deal with Barrett at the moment. He was so… loud… sometimes. She loved him for it but sometimes she just wanted quiet.

And she couldn't ask Cloud because… well, she just couldn't.

Listening, she didn't hear anything at the door and so she pushed it open and peeked out, still bent a little bit over to keep the towel on her leg. Nobody was there and the door to their rented out room was just across the hall and open. She thought that probably meant no one was in it yet.

There'd be beds in there. Nice, soft, real beds with soft blankets and softer pillows. It made up her mind for her and she straightened up, towel still over her cut and walked into the room.

No one was there and she felt her shoulders relax as her mind hazily registered how good the room smelled, so nice and clean. She left the door open so that the others would know it was okay to come wake her up when they got there. The room had three beds and she picked the one farthest from the door and closest to the window. She liked the sight of green through it. It reassured her and made her heart feel a little bit better.

She'd missed green, all those years living in the slums.

Dropping her pack next to the bed along with her socks and shoes, she pulled back the blankets and sat down. Her body threw a little party all on its own it felt so good and she smiled hazily to herself. Yeah, she'd definitely made the right call. She'd take care of her leg after she woke up. Everyone would probably be here by then anyway. If running a bar had taught her anything it was to sleep when you could. Aeris could help her with her cut when the other woman arrived. Aeris with her friendly green eyes and her unbruised knuckles. Tifa envied her and liked her at the same time.

It would be so nice to be a damsel in distress sometimes herself, she thought as she clumsily wrapped the towel around her leg so she wouldn't bleed on the nice clean sheets and snuggled down on her side facing the window. Nice to have someone else take care of her for a change and play 'hero'.

She'd had a hero once… but it looked like he'd decided to play that role for someone else now…

She turned her face into the pillow as she hunched down under the blankets and told herself she was just tired and that's why her chest felt so empty and her eyes felt so hot. Her mind was kind enough to shut up and let her fall into an exhausted sleep.

In her dreams the breeze outside the window became the wind through rotting rope and wood stretched out too far over mountain chasms. She heard the rope break and the fall seemed to go on forever.

"Tifa."

The voice was flat and emotionless and the hand that shook her shoulder lightly didn't convince her that waking up would be so grand either. She'd lived too long waking up to take care of other people though and she blinked groggy eyes open anyway.

"Let her sleep, Cloud. She's obviously exhausted," the soft, feminine voice was chiding and in response the figure next to her grunted.

"She can go back to sleep after we've talked." Her shoulder got another surprisingly light shake from the flat voice. "Come on, Tifa. You need to wake up now."

She exhaled and batted the unhelpful hand away but the figure attached to it stayed in the light that was now oil lamp induced and on the other side of her. Outside the window was dark.

"I'm up," she murmured, voice throaty. Saying it so that he'd leave instead of standing there because he obviously didn't think she'd actually get up. When had she ever not done what was needed? She sat up, starting to swing her legs over the side of the bed - and sucked in a sudden inhale and grit her teeth.

Her leg. She'd forgotten about her leg and the gash on it took her movement as its signal to remind her – forcefully – that it was there. She reached down automatically and clamped her hand over it.

The blanket was tossed off of her so unexpectedly that it startled her and jerked her entirely awake. She saw a blaze of electric blue and heard an angry sound made low in the throat in front of her. Then he spoke.

"Out." It was Cloud's controlled voice, an order, not a request. Her eyes went wide and flew up to look at him. He sounded…. under the calm control he sounded angry.

No.

He sounded _furious_.

It made her throat go suddenly tight in response and she shifted to get off the bed, not wanting to be here in the unexpected face of his fury. His hand landed heavily on her shoulder, holding her down.

"Not you," he clarified and the fury wasn't there in the emotionless voice. "Everyone else. Out. Now."

Barrett protested to Tifa's relief. But then he went. Everyone went. Simply because Cloud had ordered them to. They left the room and even shut the door behind them and left her all alone with a man she didn't know.

A really, really angry man she didn't know.

His hand left her shoulder and he strode over to the bed next to hers, carelessly tossing a bread roll he'd had in his hand onto the other bed before flipping open his pack and rummaging inside. He did it calmly, with an expressionless face in the gold light from the oil lamps that hung on the wall. And yet… she could tell he was furious.

She didn't know what he would do when he was angry.

She'd never seen him angry before. Not like this. Compared to this, his snarls at Barrett were nothing but amusements to pass his time.

It scared her because she didn't know what to expect from him when he was this way. She should. He was Cloud. She should know how he acted when he was angry. But…she didn't. Because… he didn't act the way her heart was always telling her he should.

She didn't want to face him sitting down, especially not on a bed, but she didn't want to move and stand up because it might attract his attention. Carefully, she slid her legs off the bed so she was sitting on the edge of it.

She wasn't scared of him so much as… simply scared.

"What's going – " she looked down at her bed and realized that she'd bled through the towel or it had come loose. It wasn't horrifying but it had left smears on the white of the sheets, probably from when she'd shifted as she slept and she felt suddenly guilty. She'd gotten someone else's things dirty. She started to shift and his hand suddenly clamped down hard on the top of her good thigh as he appeared in front of her again.

She made a noise, eyes going wide and both of her hands wrapped around his wrist on that hand. Because… it burned.

The leather of his glove that high up on her exposed thigh made her skin burn. Burn in a not entirely unpleasant way and she might not know a lot but she knew enough to realize how very dangerous that was for her heart.

"Cloud – " she shifted, trying to get out from under the way his fingers were searing a permanent memory of their feel into her skin and those same fingers tightened as she moved. Keeping her from escaping.

"Were you just going to bleed out while you slept?" his voice was rough and the anger was sharp in it. Had she ever thought he was emotionless? How could she have been so wrong? He wrapped the fingers on his other hand around the back of her knee on her hurt side and it sent something horrible and wonderful and dangerous straight up into the core of her. One of her hands flew automatically to spread against his shoulder. As if she would keep him away.

"No -!" she protested it quickly. Protesting his words or maybe just the fact that his touch meant too much to her. So much more than it should or that she should ever let it. She knew that already. These past few weeks had taught her to be wary of what his eyes as well as his physical proximity could do to her. She wasn't used to that and she certainly wasn't used to what he was doing now. Men didn't treat her this way. They either treated her as if she was an untouchable angel or the town slut. Either way she shied away from letting them touch her. This… she wasn't at all used to being manhandled as if someone had a right to. And he was certainly touching her now as if it was his unquestioned right.

Cloud, blue eyes mostly hidden under the fringe of his blond hair, went to his knees in front of her. She went bright red as she realized how compromising that looked - how compromising it felt – and slapped her hand down on the fabric of her skirt in automatic response. Cloud, the way only Cloud could, didn't seem to realize it as he held her leg steady with the fingers crooked behind the back of her knee and started to unwrap the towel with his other hand. It was a relief to have his hand off her other thigh but compared to the rest of what he was doing to her, it was only a little drop of water against the fire. She left her hand braced against his shoulder.

"It's nothing. Just a cut – " she squirmed a little, trying to get away because he was too close and too intent and too warm and too… too male. His eyes narrowed in response and he didn't say anything. But, she thought, he leaned a bit closer to press against her bracing hand that would have kept him at arm's length.

She could still feel the fury coming off of him in waves.

The noise escaped her before she could realize it was coming in time to stop it as the towel was carefully pried away from where it had dried, blood soaked, against her wound and his eyes flicked to her face for just a moment. That single hint of blue had been very dangerous.

"How long were you going to ignore this?" he demanded, voice low in a way that wasn't safe or reassuring at all. He slid his thumbs over the skin near it in inspection and the move had her trying to jerk her bare leg away again, prompted by a reaction that had nothing at all to do with pain.

Except maybe a surprising, sharp pain in her chest.

"Stop it. Let go – " he was angry and she was confused and feeling all kinds of strange things she'd only ever felt since he'd come back into her life and he wasn't making it easy and a part of her was glad he wasn't letting go and – "Cloud, please," she needed him to stop touching her until she'd figured out what was going on. He couldn't do this to her after she'd just woken up. She hadn't had time to brace herself against what being around him did to her. He had to stop touching her… The weakness crept into her voice despite herself. "It's nothing."

"Tifa," his golden hair hid his eyes. "You're bleeding."

And, just like that, it jerked everything to a sudden stop inside her. Made even her breath go still and silent in her lungs. Because his voice wasn't angry anymore. It was…

it sounded… hollow…

Suddenly the way he was holding her and the fact he was hiding his eyes and the tight lines around his cheeks and lips weren't aggressive. They were… vulnerable…?

scared?

Something in her heart cracked and she found herself reaching out before she realized it and jerked her hand back. He didn't move. Very carefully, barely there, she dared it again because his head was bent and his eyes weren't on her. Her fingertips found the soft spikes of his hair and rested lightly against them. He still didn't move and there were no cutting words. He'd never used cutting words with her. Only Barrett. But she was still a little afraid of them. Knowing, deep down, that if he ever did they would hurt her so much more than any blade he carried ever could. All there was in response to her touch though was the way his head bent a little bit more so that her fingers touched more of his hair and his silence. Something in her chest sighed and inexplicably relaxed as if for the first time in forever.

_Cloud…. there's my Cloud..._ it whispered.

"Cloud…" she wasn't aware that she'd sighed his name until it had already left her lips and his head bowed a little bit more. He didn't answer. Very gently, barely daring to, she stroked her fingers over his impossible hair. It felt so soft, surprising her and yet, somehow, not surprising her at all. His longer fingers curved a bit more in response but they were surprisingly soft too and when his thumb stroked over her skin again, it sent shivers of pleasure that didn't hold a sliver of fear through her.

"I'm all right," she told him, voice still a whisper. "I was going to ask someone to fix it but I was so tired. I didn't mean to scare you."

The Cloud who had haunted her bar for so many weeks now would have smirked at her. That Cloud wasn't afraid of anything and wanted to be sure the world knew it. The Cloud in front of her though just kept his head bent as his forgotten thumb kept stroking half circles along the skin of her thigh. His voice was very quiet.

"I can't – I can't see you bleeding, Tifa. I just… can't see you lying there with blood on you. Not again…"

That didn't make sense. When had he seen her bleeding before? Yes, there had been some fights but usually she was just bruised and battered. Any cuts were usually cured by the end of the fight with Cure spells. And those certainly hadn't been enough to frighten him the way the anger he'd displayed had indicated. As far as she knew, she hadn't really bled alarmingly since…

Her hand went to her chest. His eyes lifted to hers and they weren't the cold, calm blue she was so used to seeing. Instead –

instead they were everything she'd known they should be and only seen glimpses and hints of all these weeks.

"Sorry," his voice was soft. "I didn't mean to scare you. I just – " his hand caught her wrist to make her stop rubbing her knuckles over the memory ache and when he looked at her chest, for the first time since she'd hit puberty, she didn't feel like a man was staring at her breasts. In a way, she almost wished that he was. What she suspected he was really somehow seeing through the thick fabric of her top was so much more intimate than that. Except he couldn't know about the scar. She never - ever - wore shirts that would let it show and she'd certainly never told anyone about it.

"Cloud?" she asked it, uncertain, and his eyes moved back to her face. They lost some of their blue and all of their youth and vulnerability. But they didn't go cold and the emotion in them hid behind the blue instead of disappearing. She couldn't help that it made her smile a little. Hiding? She could manage hiding. Now that she knew he was still there. Gentle, stealing a moment more because she was afraid it was all she'd get as soon as they moved from their spot, she brushed some of his hair back from his face where it hung against his cheek.

"Will you take care of me? Please?" she asked softly and for just a moment, the blue was pure and rich and forever deep for her.

He didn't answer her but he bent his head and his hands shifted to cup her thigh in his palms. She shut her eyes against the way it felt but it wasn't because it felt bad or wrong. It felt right. Too right and she already knew that it was going to break her heart if she gave in to it.

His touch was gentle but sure as he examined the wound and he made a soft noise, a hum, that drew her attention away from the things he was making her feel with his touch. She opened her eyes to look at him and his face was calm and competent again as he examined her leg.

"I knew I cast Cure after our last fight." She hadn't been aware of it but if Cloud said he had than he had. Cloud was nothing if not aware of the strangely small details of what happened around and to their group. His fingers curved around her leg and he looked up at her from under his bangs.

"It looks like that last monster left one of its claw quills in you. Do you trust me to pull it out or do you want me to get Aeris?"

"You." She said it without hesitation or even thought. It was instinctive. Cloud… she trusted Cloud. More than anyone or anything. For a split second, his lips almost smiled. Then he was bending his head over her again and his light squeeze against her thigh was warning her to brace herself. She did, squinting her eyes shut and knotting her fingers in the fabric of her skirt.

Her other hand found his steady shoulder again though and this time she held on tightly to him.

She felt a tug and it hurt but she'd had a lot of things hurt worse in her lifetime. There was a strange sliding sensation and another little tug at the end that made a little noise that was as much surprise as pain slip out between her pressed lips. He held what he'd pulled out up for her to see and neither one of them found it a strange thing to do. Gingerly, she touched it. It was long and thin and almost transparent, so that her blood showed red and dark black where it had dried.

"It's not broken. We got it all out," he told her before she even thought to wonder. Mute, she nodded and he tossed it on the towel near his feet and then took the materia he'd been brought over and left by her boots in his hand and pressed it lightly into the cup in the back of her knee. It slowly grew warm between the palm of his hand and her skin. She exhaled a quiet sound and relaxed as the now familiar warmth moved through her blood stream and danced like music over the gash on her thigh.

She always felt impossibly snuggly after the warmth of a Cure spell.

Tifa forced herself to stay upright and not lean down and hug Cloud when he finished with the spell. Just because he'd showed her a little of who she'd known he was, didn't mean she got to maul him.

His hands felt very, very nice on her bare leg though…

Brows down in concentration, he slowly wiped away the left over blood that was still on her skin where the wound had once been. Very minutely, as if she wouldn't notice, he also turned her leg in his hand to check it for other cuts or bruises. She realized her hand was still on his shoulder, keeping him close.

She also realized that her other leg was snugged in against his side.

They were also very close together and the room was very warm and –

And a part of her that really shouldn't even exist thought it would be really nice to just slid down into his lap this way and snuggle close.

As soon as the thought fully registered, her eyes went wide at herself and she jerked her leg out of his hand. His blue eyes lifted, half lidded and hot and lazy looking under his lashes. They didn't look away from her. Whatever was in them, it made her mouth go dry.

"Um" she inhaled. "I'm okay now. I – thanks. I – thank you, Cloud."

He shook his head as if he was just waking up and cleared his throat.

"Yeah," he nodded and stood up. "It was nothing."

His hand patted the top of her thigh and it was meant as a friendly gesture. Except the touch seemed to linger against her skin much longer than she was sure he'd meant it to. She felt suddenly shy and unsure of what was happening again.

"Thank you anyway," she told him softer, looking away and to the side, and he nodded before leaning back down to gather up the things he'd used, wrapping the quill in the towel before he moved back to set them on his bed and put the materia away. Tifa stood up and tested her leg but it felt fine. Well, her knees felt a little weak but she knew that wasn't the wound or the materia. Cloud reached for the bread roll he'd tossed on his bed earlier and then hesitated and wiped his hand off before picking it up. He offered it casually across the bed.

"It was supposed to be for you," his voice was back to emotionless and calm. She took it and saw the bread was stuffed with ham and a type of cheese she hadn't seen since childhood. Her eyes went back to him but he was calmly stripping down her bed to bundle up the dirty sheets with the stained towel, everything about him efficient and unruffled again. Impersonal.

The secret part of her home that always found her. Even when she didn't think it would…

She reached out and took the bundled sheets from him.

"I'll go get new ones," she told him, suddenly, strangely, feeling almost comfortable with this part of him too. "I'll tell everyone else they can come back too."

"Tell Barrett if he snores again tonight I'm making him sleep in the hallway," he told her casually, without a flicker of humor, as he pulled the covers back up over the bed, tucking the blankets in with easy moves that spoke of long embedded habits. She hid her smile as she turned and started for the door.

Cloud Strife was a puzzle. For the first time, she felt as if she'd been given a corner piece.

"Tifa…"

His low voice stopped her and she turned her head to look at him. He paused and his blue eyes found her in the golden oil light.

"I want you to come to me from now on. When you get hurt."

The smile was whispering around the edges of her lips and singing in her chest. She didn't know what had just happened or even if anything was different between them than it had been before. She was probably being a fool – the way she'd noticed women seemed to become for him. She just knew, for the first time in a long time, she felt… better inside.

"Yes," she promised with a nod. "I will."


	9. Chapter 9: Fake

_after I wrote the last prompt, this one just insisted on following. Game-time Cloud apparently has issues. The idea came from a prompt in Tae's LJ group asking for Cloud and Tifa after the Cloud/Aeris date at the Gold Saucer. That and the fact that the Cloud from the last chapter told me on no uncertain terms that he wanted to be in bed with Tifa. Strangely, this is exactly what he meant when he said it. This is also in direct response to Fairheartstrife's last review. I've got to admit, I'm not sure how in-character this version of Cloud is. It was mostly inspired by a comment someone made after reading the new _Case of Tifa_ in which they mentioned that Cloud, and what he wanted, had gotten pretty apparent with the new revisions. It was Tifa that was still confusing._

**Fake**

by TamLin

Tifa lay in bed curled on her side facing the window with her hands tucked up against her chest. It was raining with beautiful bursts of lightening outside her window and while she usually liked rain and stormy nights, the one outside was fake. Fake the same way the gravestones on the lawn were fake, fake the way the 'ghosts' that moved through the mirror on the wall were fake, fake the way…

fake the way her hopes were…

She curled a little bit smaller on her side under the blankets and listened to the fake rain and the fake thunder.

Her fake life…

She knew she shouldn't be doing this to herself. She shouldn't. It was only going to make her miserable. More miserable. She blinked at the fake raindrops that chased their way down the glass of the window and tried not to think.

Tried not to think about poor Red XIII and what mad scientists might have done to him. Tried not to think about how utterly overwhelming hunting down Sephiroth seemed if she looked at it too closely.

Tried not to think about Aeris and the date she was on…

There had to be something wrong with her that she was letting herself get upset over Aeris taking Cloud out for a night of laughter and fun. They were at the Gold Saucer, weren't they? Cloud should have fun, even if it was only for a night. Aeris was good at making people feel better. Tifa knew she should be glad someone could get through Cloud's shell and maybe coax him into forgetting to frown and fixate on dire future events, at least for one night?

Would it be the whole night?

The _whole_ night…?

She winced at the way it made her chest hurt and clenched her hands a little closer to her chest.

Usually Tifa couldn't stand being alone for long. Right now though, she couldn't bear the thought of being around anyone. And since the strange stuffed cat on the stranger stuffed white beast had said the rooms were free – well, after Aeris had left, Tifa had quietly repacked her backpack and snuck down to the front desk to ask for a private room.

It probably made her spoiled. She just couldn't bear listening to anyone else right now.

Not Yuffie, wondering cheerfully about whether there was any materia in the claw arcade machine. And certainly not Aeris when she came back from her…

from her date with Cloud.

The other girl knew how she felt. The same way Tifa knew how Aeris felt. They'd reached a silent agreement though not to let it ruin the time they enjoyed together as friends. Aeris certainly wouldn't brag about whatever she and Cloud did. It was just that Tifa didn't think she could even bear seeing the other woman come back smiling.

She hunched into a slightly smaller ball.

If Aeris even came back at all tonight…

She wished she could get angry but she couldn't. Aeris had decided to convince Cloud to go out and enjoy the amusement park with her. She was brave enough, sure enough of herself, that she could. Tifa didn't consider herself a coward. She might have, eventually, thought of the idea herself. But Aeris had thought of it first and she'd spoken about it first, almost from the second they'd arrived.

Tifa understood. She really did.

She just… she just didn't want to have to deal with it.

She didn't want to deal with it so strongly that she'd asked the desk clerk that had given her the room to not tell anyone where she was. She couldn't imagine that anyone would come looking for her this late anyway but it had made her feel better to ask. To know that she could, for tonight at least, drop her usual mask of being positive and just hurt for a little while. Not for long, of course. She'd be fine tomorrow and back to her old self. Just… just for tonight, she wanted to be allowed to admit her heart hurt.

And it did.

oh… it did…

Because she wanted what Aeris had. She wanted to be the reason blue eyes smiled the way she was sure they were right now somewhere beyond the fake rain and lightening. She wanted to be the reason he forgot to be serious and actually _played_, even if it was just for tonight in a fake world.

She wanted him to be _happy_. And she wanted, selfishly, to be the reason he was.

The thunder rolled outside on its prerecorded track and the floorboards squeaked the way the small motors under them shifted them to and the fake rain fell on the blank window and filled her eyes that felt just as blank.

There were two distinct thuds on the floor behind her next to her bed and she frowned. Those were new sounds in a room that was full of squeaking floors and rattling glass at the window. Was she supposed to think those were ghost noises or –

The bed sank on that side as well and that did startled her back to awareness. She was pretty sure moving beds weren't part of the 'atmosphere' the hotel was trying to create. She started to roll, eyes wide, with some vague idea of the bed breaking in half thanks to overzealous interior decorators, when she felt a hand land on her shoulder to keep her still.

She froze.

Her. Tifa Lockhart. Zangan trained – froze. Instead of reaching up to grab that hand and throw its owner through the window. Which could only mean one person in the entire world.

"Stay put."

Cloud's voice was flat and low. His hand stayed on her shoulder until he was sure she wasn't going to move. Then it left but she felt the blanket on that side lift and a second later he was sliding under the covers with her.

Now she really was frozen and it was for an entirely different reason. It was simple shock.

What?

What – what?!

His body nudged up against hers and he reached over her to drop an extra room key on the night table before shifting thoughtfully, trying to find a comfortable spot.

What?

What… just _what_?!

With a rough noise he settled down and his arm slipped over her waist as his body fit itself completely around the curve of hers. Eyes huge, she felt him keep adjusting his position until they were tucked together from her heels all the way up to the backs of her shoulders.

This wasn't happening. It wasn't. It didn't make any sense at all and Cloud had never – would never – they'd never –

Just… never.

Still not content with their closeness, he moved her now, hand shifting to her hip to press her closer against him there, leg shifting to lay over top of both of hers so that the fabric of his pants dragged against the bare skin of her legs, his other arm shifting so that it slipped under her and could wrap around her as well to hold her tightly against himself.

He did it all without a sound past an occasional grunt as he shifted or exhale as he found a way to wrap closer around her curled body.

This… what was… how… did he…? Her mind couldn't even pick one question out of the flurry inside her head. It didn't help that he was warm against her and carried the smell of mountain wind and lightening she'd come to associate with him. It certainly didn't help that his hands were careless about how they touched her, as if he wasn't aware that he didn't have a right to or that he should have boundaries he wasn't supposed to cross. Finally one of his hands wrapped around the both of hers that were still clenched against her chest and he seemed to settle.

Settle?

What was he doing!? They'd gotten more comfortable with each other in their journey so far but they'd never – he'd never – they'd certainly never been… been…

physical like this.

For pity's sake, she was still just trying to adjust to the way her skin seemed to burst into flame when all he did was look at her across the campfire sometimes at night and that was usually when he was simply asking if she wanted more to eat before he finished whatever was in the pot for the night. This was… What was he - ?

"Cloud…?" she whispered it, entirely unsure of what was going on. He made a noncommittal answering noise in his throat and his body started to relax against hers. She tried to give in to the urge to fidget but with her body tucked so intimately against his she didn't dare and when she tried to with her fingers, they were both already tangled with the fingers of his single hand. His other hand was resting alarmingly over her stomach.

The shirt and shorts she slept in didn't quite cover her stomach.

"How did you know where I was?"

It wasn't at all the question she wanted to ask. What she wanted to ask was 'what are you doing?' and, more importantly by a long stretch –

'what are you doing _to me_?'

What came out though was the safer question. His answer was calm and factual, slightly throaty with sleep.

"I asked."

She shook her head, just a little, which was almost all she could manage movementwise by this point he was wrapped so completely around her.

"I told the clerk not to say."

Were they really talking about something that mundane? Was she really having this conversation while his body enveloped hers and the skin of his exposed fingers that the glove didn't cover burned like a fire against her stomach and his breath whispered just as hot against her throat? It felt impossibly surreal and she would have been sure she was dreaming except even her dreams made more sense than suddenly having Cloud Strife crawl into bed with her. His answer was flat.

"Tifa. I _asked_."

"oh… oh!" She suddenly felt sorry for the poor desk clerk. Mako eyes could be terrifying when they held the force of Cloud's determination behind them. She paused and pressed her lips together. Barely there, she whispered:

"…why…?"

He was quiet for so long that she thought he'd either gone to sleep or was ignoring her. His arms around her didn't loosen though.

"Tifa," his voice was very quiet and it paused for another very long minute. "Am I here with you?"

"um… yes?" Her fingers tried to fidget again in the tangle of his. Wasn't that the problem? Or… maybe _problem_ wasn't the word but wasn't that what the point was?

"Not somebody else? Me?"

She managed to turn her head a little then. Just enough to see the pale color of his hair from the edges of her eyes.

"Cloud?" she finally managed to free one of her hands and she lightly, gingerly, touched the bare arm he had banded across her chest. The truth slipped out before she could edit it. "I wouldn't be letting anyone else touch me this way but you, would I?"

"No." His response was immediate and hard. Flat. Final. His arms tightened almost painfully around her and his fingers closed around hers that were still twined with his. Her stomach took a loop that would have made a rollar coaster designer proud. It was quiet for a long moment and then she felt him relax a little bit again. He surprised her by burying his face in the back of her shoulder. It muffled his voice as he quietly asked:

"I don't… remind you of anyone else. Do I?"

Only yourself, she wanted to tell him. He only reminded her, just sometimes, of the boy she'd known in Nibelheim. When he wasn't being a stranger and threatening hotel clerks so that he could crawl into her bed without invitation. When he wasn't being hard and cold and careless and she'd see a whisper of the sensitive young boy with the shining, determined eyes… that's when he reminded her of – himself…

Most of the time she didn't recognize him. Just… sometimes. Sometimes he was thoughtful and quietly kind and overprotective of his small team of misfits.

"Tifa?"

She shook her head a little and gently stroked her fingers over his forearm. The way he was holding her, it was almost the only way she could move.

"You just remind me of you, Cloud. Nobody else."

She felt him relax against her then and it went all the way through him so that he lay heavy against her. It surprised her and made her feel strangely protective of him. His warmth and weight against her wasn't a bad feeling at all.

"That's right," he murmured against her skin and it was more to himself than her. "I'm Cloud. You said so yourself. I'm Cloud. You would know."

The words woke that little sliver of fear she hid in her chest. Because… he was Cloud. Wasn't he? He remembered growing up with her in Nibelheim. He had remembered her name when they'd first met. He had the same spiky blond hair and blue eyes even if they glowed now as they hadn't seven years ago.

Five years ago…

He said five. She was sure it was seven. He remembered Nibelheim burning. But he hadn't been there…

He could be cold and uncaring. He could be sweet and thoughtful.

The fake rain fell on the window. But if it was water falling from above, it was still rain, wasn't it? Even if it came from pipes instead of clouds, if it fell from above… what else did you call it but rain?

Cloud remembered their childhood promise.

Only Cloud would know about that. He even remembered that she'd been late getting there…

Who else would he be but Cloud?

"Tifa."

His quiet voice blended in with the sound of the rain on the window and he hadn't moved. She'd thought he was falling asleep.

"Mm?"

Again he was quiet for a long time but she was getting used to that about him. After a long moment, he calmly asked in that dark honey voice of his that still refused to carry emotion:

"Why didn't you come to my room tonight?"

It jerked and froze her in almost the same instant and she went absolutely still in his arms. For a long moment, her mind refused to even acknowledge the question. He lay still against her and waited with a seemingly unlimited supply of unruffled patience.

It forced her to face the question.

She knew what his question had sounded like and she also knew he hadn't meant it that way. Any other man would have meant it 'that way' but it didn't occur to Cloud. The same way it didn't seem to occur to him that climbing into bed with her and practically mauling her might be considered inappropriate.

Or even unwelcome… Wait! Should she be worried he'd known she wouldn't throw him out…!?

She gave her head a little shake to focus it and loosened her hand where it had clamped down over his arm when he'd asked.

He meant 'why hadn't she been the one to take him out on a date?' Unfortunately, that question wasn't any easier to answer. In some ways, it was even more awkward in fact.

"Aeris…" she whispered the name, staring in embarrassment as the drops of water chasing down the glass of the window. Her hand rubbed against his forearm, nervous. It was hard enough to find an answer anyway, much less with his body lying like hot coals, covering and heavy and warm, around hers. He waited.

"Aeris wanted to take you," she stumbled over it. "I thought – I thought – " what had she thought?

"I thought you'd have fun with her."

He made a noise to show he'd heard but it was noncommittal. Then he shifted his head so it rested against the side of hers, body moving to shift hers somehow impossibly closer as he relaxed. It was quiet for a very long time and she felt his breathing starting to slow. It surprised her to realize she was starting to feel a little drowsy too. He was very warm and smelled familiar. More…

She felt safe this way. Had she not felt safe before?

His drowsy voice wove in with the sound of falling rain against her ears. Half asleep, what he mumbled just before he drifted off didn't make any sense to her but half asleep it didn't occur to her to do anything but hum in agreeable response. When she woke up the next morning alone in her bed, the room empty of any signs but her own, only then did it occur to her to wonder if she'd heard him right. Because what she'd thought she'd heard still didn't seem to make sense. Had he really chuckled:

'I kissed the dragon'?


	10. Chapter 10: Here With You

_I've been thinking of this angle since I wrote _Taken Away_. It struck me while I was watching ACC and I don't know that it was really explored or explained - so, hey! that's what we do, right? It's set directly after ACC. I realize things were written very snuggly but my theory at least is that by this point and time in their lives Cloud and Tifa have been together long enough to be past the 'careful, don't touch' stage with each other even if they may not be to the 'and why do I always feel the need to touch her so badly in the first place?' stage. I hope that it's a believable reaction between Cloud and Tifa after so many 'she's dead, she's not dead, he's dead, he's not dead, we're dead, we're not dead' situations piled one after another directly on top of them. It's one of my least polished pieces so I'm sorry if it's not up to expectations. And, before I get run over by cute brown soft looking boots I want to point out that in my head Cloud put the quotes around the 'sainted'. I get the impression it pisses him off slightly that people have made Aerith into a 'saint' and stolen her humanity and just how much it really did cost her to sacrifice herself. It's a tarnishing of her memory to him and not that he was mocking her himself at all. Ah, and the question at the end? That's from _Case of Tifa_. Though its possible you could guess what she waited until she thought he was sleeping to ask him anyway._

_ps - am I the only one that noticed how often Cloud made it a point to say Tifa's name in the original game, especially at the beginning?_

**Here With You**

by TamLin

"You left because you were sick, because you didn't want to be a burden."

His hand stroked her cheek and she closed her eyes and tipped her chin to make it easier for him. She always tried to make things easier for him. He made a soft sound in his throat. It was a hum and a laugh and sad all at the same time and in response to her move, his hand slid into her hair and cradled the back of her head.

"You always make me sound better than I am," he breathed it against her forehead as he drew her closer and his other arm slid around her waist. "Tifa…"

She had once told him that words weren't the only way to show someone how you felt. She'd lied. Every time he said her name, the way he felt filled the single exhale and overflowed it like warm golden honey-wine. It was one of the reasons he said her name so much. Even when they'd first meet again in Midgar, all those years and lifetimes ago, for the longest time her name had been the only one he would say. Over and over again...

He was warm, always warm, and she curled her fingers in the knit of his shirt and leaned into that. Into the familiar smell and warmth and feel of him and even though she'd survived without it while he'd been gone, a part of her wouldn't wake without that near her. His lips touched her forehead again and they were parted slightly, resting against her –

But then his head dipped and his golden hair fell across his eyes. His fingers wove in her hair and sent shivers over her skin.

"I left because I didn't want to hurt you."

"Leaving us hurt more than – "

"No." He stopped her with the soft, implacable note in his velvet voice and the way his fingers on the back of her head tightened imperceptibly. "Tifa…" his fingers slipped down to rub a light circle against the back of her neck, melting her bones and muscles.

"Tifa… I heard him. In my head. I heard him in my head the way I used to when we were hunting him the first time."

Next to the fire he always gave her with his touch, the ice shivered in great icicles down through her at his words and sent sharp crystals whirling through her blood, filling her lungs with cold. It surprised her when her breath didn't mist as she exhaled in shock and protest. His fingers didn't stop their slow, comforting movement against her and where he held her, his gloved hand slipped under the very edge of the hem of her shirt to rest reassuringly against her skin. Her hands spread on his chest and she tipped her head back in the cup of his palm to look at him with wide eyes.

"Sephiroth…"

Unlike the witches from the mountain fairytales of their childhood, naming the demon didn't invite his presence. It made him manageable and definable. It stole his mystery and made him familiar. Cloud's blue on blue eyes found hers and they were guilty and scared and sad… and yet not as guilty and scared and sad as she had been afraid they would be.

"I would have left because I was sick," he agreed. "But I wouldn't have been able to stay away from you, all of you, for as long as I did. I'm too weak, I need your comfort too much, for that." His low voice was a soft rumble. It was what he'd told the children. It was what she'd assumed for that matter and he'd let her. But he'd never actually told her -

Cloud never lied to her. Never. He _had_ learned to simply not volunteer information though…

"I thought – I thought you didn't want to hurt us with knowing you were – you were sick," she stumbled over it, only able to say it now because it was over. He was safe. Denzel was safe. And – because they were, so was the entire family. "I thought you were running, just for a little while, until you could settle it inside yourself."

Had she known he'd left and it wasn't just a prolonged delivery? Of course. Had she assumed he had left for good? Of course not. Cloud always came back to her. Even when he didn't know what he was doing, Cloud always came back to her. The edges of his lips shifted weakly and he moved her so that she was cradled against his chest, half in his lap, so that he could hold her in the safe shelter of his arms and feel how she didn't resist it, how she trusted him completely to hold her that way. Tifa Lockhart… sake and sugar, silk and steel. And she only – ever – went helpless and soft for him…

"That too," he agreed. Because she was right. He would have run anyway. Not far, not for long, but he was still the Cloud Strife that needed to internalize problems, that needed to deal with them on his own first before he felt comfortable presenting them to anyone else. He still felt the need to be more and better and invincible for the people that he protected even if his head told him life didn't work out that way. So he would have run – but he wouldn't have stayed away. Not from her. Not from their children. Not from his home. Not for long. Except –

"I couldn't risk you. Or the children. Not after what happened the last time." His eyes searched hers and he saw the way her heart bled over into those smoke and ruby depths. It hurt and healed his own heart at the same time and he reached up to reverently brush his bare fingers over her cheek. She rested her head in the cradle of his arm and shoulder and looked up at him. Bleeding for him. Peaceful and trusting.

He'd hurt her. He wasn't blind. He'd make it right. But for now, for tonight, so suddenly free of the fear and the pain and the worry, there was only each other. The children were celebrating with Barret, Seventh Heaven was closed. This was just for them. Tomorrow she'd worry if he would come home after work. Tomorrow he'd come home early to prove that he would. Tomorrow the children would wake up and peek into his room to make sure his bags were still empty and left in his closet and Denzel would pretend he wasn't touching his forehead to double check and –

And tomorrow.

Tonight was for relief and themselves. For touching to prove to themselves and each other that they were still alive, still together, still whole. And – for him at least – it was time for a confession he would only give once and only to the woman in his arms.

"I remember," she told him and it was only because she did, because she was her, that he would ever admit what he just had. She was the only person he would ever tell and his shame, his secret, that ugly flaw in his very soul, would only ever be for her to see.

"I hurt Aerith the last time," his voice didn't break but it stumbled, the memory still fractured and disjointed in his head and yet sharply painful because he knew it was true. He had hurt the gentle Cetra he should have been protecting. "He used me to hurt her. He tried to use me to kill her. I couldn't – I would never risk you or the children that way. When I heard his voice… I knew I had to stay away. She forgave me for hurting her. I would never be able to forgive myself if I hurt one of you."

The pain of being away from his family… _his family_… had been impossible. He hadn't even been able to answer when they'd called on the phone because he'd known – he'd known if he did, he'd go home. Go home to the woman that carried his heart, to the children that filled it… he'd go home. And what if Sephiroth used him to hurt them?

Her fingers found his face and he realized he'd been drowning in her wine and shadow eyes for a while, so soft and bottomless and warm. The roughened, soft tips of her slender fingers traced his features and he saw her smile. Saw her lips soften for him and he almost forgot the conversation as the desire to kiss her washed over him in wave after slow wave.

"You didn't," she whispered and his heart lurched to hear… pride? in her voice…

"You didn't," she repeated. "Not once. He couldn't use you, not even once. Not this whole time…"

It bemused him, enchanted him, felled him with one swift stroke.

"How do you know?" he couldn't help but ask, feeling like a little boy. Her smile was there again and just for him as the tip of a single finger lightly tapped the tip of his nose.

"Cloud Strife, do you think I can't recognize guilt in your eyes by now? You were afraid he would use you, but I don't see any guilt in your eyes that he did. You're whole now. He can't call you his puppet or manipulate you anymore. You're too strong."

She gave him the last sentence like a velvet wrapped sword for him to carry and – he believed it. He believed it because she did. Because she… only she… would know. It made the edges of his lips shift shyly and the single move was a sword stroke of its own to her heart but she cherished it and held it close. His body shifted over hers and he laid her down on her back, the rug under her and her bed he'd been leaning against the leg of behind them as he settled down over her.

Her almost lover…

Her always, only almost lover…

"I had an attack," his voice was low as his body fit itself to hers the way it always did, the way his was the only one that ever could. His hand slid down to cup her thigh and bring her leg up. She knew he liked her legs. She saw the way he watched them when he thought she wasn't noticing… and the way he flushed when he realized she had. She let him and her arms slipped up to wind around his shoulders.

"In the church. When I was with you. When you were – "

She nodded and saved him from having to say the words. Soothed away the way it made his heart stop even now. She'd been so still, so frail.

So his…

He inhaled and slipped an arm under her head to cradle it, to give him an excuse to feel her silk soft hair over his skin.

"I thought he was going to use me, to hurt you. It was the first time I fought one of the attacks." The pain, the feeling of 'other', the terrifying familiarity of blacking out and not knowing what happened between that and opening his eyes in a different surrounding. The sheer terror that he might have done something – might have hurt her. The near silent exhale the only relief he'd let himself have when he'd seen her breathing and safe next to him on Marlene's bed….

The fact that, even though he'd known he should have, he hadn't been able to leave once he'd found himself near her again. The way he'd waited in balanced pain for her to find the words he knew he needed to hear but couldn't find for himself in his tangle of self-inflicted isolation and feelings of uselessness…

"I said I wasn't fit to protect anyone because I wasn't. Tifa, I could have been used."

Only she loved him enough to understand the horror and violation of that. Only she loved him enough to take it into herself and look at him without a flicker of fear or disgust or pity. Only her.

Even the 'sainted' Aerith had run away from him. She just hadn't run far enough...

"You weren't," her fingers stroked his face, slipped through his hair and lightly tugged it to draw him down to her. He went with an exhale and rested his head in the curve of her shoulder. Her fingers sent shivers and soothing warmth down his neck and shoulders as they played with the restless spikes in his hair. Her heart beat under him and he could hear it as well as feel it. "You were Cloud Strife and you kicked his ass. Again."

It made him laugh, surprising him, and wrinkling his eyes shut, as the almost silent sound escape his lips past his suddenly showing teeth. He felt her laughter, just as silent as well. They'd gotten good at sharing their silences. His arms tightened around her.

As children they'd dreamed of him becoming her hero. It was only later that he'd figured it out. She said he'd always been her hero. He knew it was because she made him that way. He slid one hand up her vest and tugged the zipper down. They had a strict 'clothes on' relationship. It was how they got away with being close physically without stepping over any lines.

He thought he was ready, finally ready, to challenge a few of those lines.

He was Cloud Strife. And he thought, maybe, finally, he was stronger than the ghosts that lived inside him.

She inhaled in surprise and he heard her heart beat go broken but she laid her hand over his on the zipper and it was permission, not protest. It made him smile against her and he linked her fingers over the top of his before tugging the zipper the rest of the way free and then sliding his hand down to the silk fabric of her shirt to trace circles over her delicate ribs, unhindered by leather.

"Are you…" she paused and he heard the way her voice fluttered between emotions. He heard the whispered laughter in it though and knew he was going to get away with this. "Are you coping a feel, Cloud Strife?"

He made a serious humming sound against her and she felt the way it vibrated down into the very core of her bones. His thumb flicked out to threaten and yet not touch anything more intimate than the curve of her rib. Which was starting to feel intimate enough.

"It seems like I finally don't have to worry about anyone else showing up in my head at the wrong time."

She shut her eyes and didn't know whether to smile or chide. How could he say such horrible, teasing, serious lines with such a calm, 'straight' voice? Especially when she _knew_ he was joking with her… and dead serious at the same time.

He shifted them both then and she was lying on top of him with his hands on her hips and his blue eyes under hers were dark and full of light at the same time. Was it really this simple?

Yes.

And no.

But sometimes… yes.

"I'm still not right inside," he warned and she looked down at him with eyes that said she knew. With eyes that said she loved him, not 'in spite of' or even 'because of', but 'just the same'.

"You are pretty messed up," she told him and because it was her, and only her, it made him laugh. Because she would know. And, for her, it was all right.

She cupped his face in her hands and his eyes found hers, sank into hers, lost themselves in hers – but it was all right. Because she'd lost herself in that blue fire long ago herself and each time she fell into it again, it rekindled the light in her own soul.

"Yes," he told her in a murmur as one of his hands, the one he'd taken the glove off of, lifted to stroke the hair back from her face and she tipped her head at him.

"Yes?" she asked and he smiled a little shyly and a little smugly.

"Yes," he repeated. "I do wake up when people come into my room no matter how quiet they are and I hear really well in the dark too. And since I already answered your question about Marlene I thought I should answer your first two questions too. The answer to both of them is 'yes'." He paused while her eyes went wide.

"'Yes' and 'always'," he amended seriously.


	11. Chapter 11: Seduction

_this came as a direct result of Cloud's decision to make things right with Tifa in the last chapter. The characters wouldn't leave me alone until I wrote it. Set after ACC._

**Seduction**

by TamLin

Cloud Strife was seducing her.

Tifa stood at the kitchen counter with a knife in one hand and a mound of carrots next to the chopping board in front of her and stared absently out the window.

Cloud Strife was seducing her…

It had started out so innocently after the Geostigma incident that she'd missed it's beginning entirely. He'd started to linger over their breakfasts together. Or rather, her preparing breakfast for the still sleeping children and him sitting at the kitchen table watching her with a mug of coffee in his hands. In the past, he would have inhaled the coffee no matter how hot, made sure he knew what her and the children's plans were for the day and then been out the door the second his mug touched the bowl of the sink. Not rushing to leave them but rushing because his delivery days were always full. Now he still sat at the kitchen table with his coffee and watched her make breakfast. He still made sure he knew what she and the children were doing for the day. It was just… now he watched her instead of the ingredients she put into the breakfast. She could feel his eyes on her. His intent attention. The same way she could feel it as he listened to whatever she and the children had planned. An extra attention, as if he was more than listening but actively committing it to memory. That… and he would always wait until she was near the sink to bring his coffee mug over now. She'd tested it several times, lingering away from the sink when she knew it was time for him to go. And he'd waited. Pretending for all the world as if he had no idea what the time was even though she knew he always did. And when she'd move to the sink – because she couldn't bear making him late for long before she caved - he'd push back from the table and stand, walking over with his coffee mug in his hand to set it in the sink. Reaching around her to do it. Even if he incidentally had to have the coffee mug in the other hand to do it. Standing so close to her while he did so that she could feel the brush of his breathing against her cheek or shoulder as he reached past her to calmly set the mug in the sink. So close that his body would brush hers. And then he would turn and be gone with his usual estimate of when he'd be home that night, leaving her puzzled, and blushing and a little too warm while he acted as if he had no idea what he'd just done to her entire day.

And then there were the flowers.

Tifa didn't consider herself a flower girl. Not the way Aerith had been, not even close. But two weeks ago, Cloud had brought her a flower. Just a single flower. It hadn't been one of Aerith's lilies. It had been a small, bright, cheerful little thing that had still smelled of a grassy field somewhere and Cloud had brought it in with Fenrir's saddle bags thrown over his shoulder after coming back from a day and a half absence on deliveries. He'd given it to her in passing, holding it out to her absently while he gave her his usual kiss on her forehead, himself smelling like oil and road and sweat and wild wind, before he'd passed through the bar she'd been doing paperwork at the counter of and gone upstairs where she heard the shower start running. Leaving her sitting there, stunned and confused with the innocent little unsuspecting flower in her hands.

She'd tried to keep it alive but it had died within a few days, fading away and leaving her feeling strangely heartbroken.

Except he'd brought her another, different lost little wildflower, held delicately between his gloved fingers after a trip to Fort Condor later that week. A brush of lips against her forehead, the flower, the wonderful male scent of him and then he'd been gone again and the pipes had made their noise as the shower started.

There was no pattern to it. Just… random wildflowers and Cloud pretending he'd forgotten he had them in his hand when he gave one to her.

Sometimes when she thought about it at night she almost cried for no reason she could imagine. Remembering the first time he'd brought her a flower in a city without light, when he'd been a man she didn't know and yet always had.

He did worse to her abused heart than just flowers and breakfast though.

He picked up the children from school. They usually walked back to the bar. Seventh Heaven wasn't that far from Edge's only school and it gave them a chance to play with their friends. Homework always waited until after dinner anyway. Tifa thought children should be allowed to play. Marlene and Denzel knew what they could and couldn't do and she knew they liked the safe independence of walking home themselves. The first time she'd heard Fenrir outside in the late afternoon she'd assumed Cloud had forgotten something and gone to the bottom of the stairs to look across the bar at the front door in curiosity. Except the door had burst open with more force than Cloud usually used to open it and Marlene had come tearing in, giddy and helplessly desperate to tell Tifa that Cloud had surprised them all by picking them up at the school and how jealous all her friends would be by tomorrow. Denzel had come in with Cloud and it had made Tifa's heart swell to see the hero worship glow so bright in the little boy's eyes as he, forgetting he was too old, had clung to Cloud's hand. Those mako blue eyes had met hers with a soft smile in them and for that single moment, her family had been a real family and entirely whole and happy.

As random as her flowers, Cloud picked up the children from that point on. Quiet surprises that were scattered enough to still make all of their hearts shudder with both longing and love.

He wasn't just seducing her. He was seducing his entire family.

As if the children hadn't already been hopelessly in love with him.

As if she hadn't…

Tifa exhaled and looked down at the carrots. She'd promised the bar patrons pot pie tonight and she needed to start soon if she wanted the crust to be as light and flaky as they seemed to think only she could make it.

Cloud had started smuggling her food.

It made the edges of her lips curve as she tried not to smile.

It had started with one of Shera's 'to die for' chocolate scones. She knew the other woman hoarded them for the rare times Cloud visited on his deliveries. It didn't matter what kind of schedule he was running or how far behind it he was, Shera's scones could stop him in his tracks and glue him to a chair until they were entirely gone. Tifa knew because they'd both giggled over it at the other woman's wedding when Cloud had 'innocently' wandered into her kitchen that was supposed to be off limit to the guests looking for them.

So Tifa hadn't been sure she'd been seeing what she really had when she'd gone into her bedroom late one night with only thoughts of her soft bed in her mind and seen one of those coveted scones sitting on a napkin on her nightstand. Three days later it had been a powder cake from the Gold Saucer. A week later it had been one of the honey rolls from Cosmo Canyon. Last night had revealed a little shredded coconut and lime concoction she'd never had before but that had reminded her of Costa del Sol.

Cloud was always in bed and asleep by the time she found them and he never mentioned them the next morning. The one time she had thanked him, he'd just looked calmly at her and acted as if he didn't know what she was thanking him for. Even if his blue eyes had looked pleased and happy as he'd done it.

She could have excused all of it, tucked it away as Cloud quietly making it a point to be a part of his family, and been entirely happy with that explanation. Except… there was the touching…

…oh… the touching…

Tifa finally set down the knife and gave in and wrapped her arms around herself.

Cloud was starting to touch her.

It wasn't that they hadn't touched before. With people that he cared about Cloud could get very handsy. It was rare to see one of the children near him without his hand on their shoulder or head or around theirs. And, even though he never instigated, he certainly didn't shy away when one of their friends touched him. Cid was forever pounding him on the shoulder in greeting and Yuffie had taken to whirlwind hugs that gave her an excuse to pat him down for new materia. Cid's rough affection always got one of Cloud's shy, quiet smiles and she noticed that he intentionally switched out his usual armlet materia with flashier bits he didn't mind losing whenever he had forewarning about the arrival of the little ninja. Well, all right – that last part might be less to encourage Yuffie's hugs and more as a common sense measure against having something he actually needed stolen from him but still – it wasn't as if he actually dodged the ninja hugs when they came. She'd even caught him dozing in the curve of a sleeping Nanaki's side once or twice when one of the group's parties had gone on for longer than its usual two-day crawl. She had a hoarded picture of one time that had happened and a mischievous Cait Sith had crawled into his crossed arms just so that Tifa could get a picture that still made her heart giggle whenever she looked at it on her nightstand.

It would have shocked strangers to hear that Cloud Strife enjoyed physical contact. Between his eyes and his mannerisms, he managed to hold the rest of the world at further than arm's length. But from his closest friends and particularly his family, Cloud Strife accepted physical touch and, for the children, he actually even instigated it. Sometimes, he had even been known to instigate it with her too. So it wasn't unusual, for instance, for Cloud to kiss her forehead or rest his hand on her shoulder. She'd taught him how to hug. It wasn't even unheard of, if he was tired enough and helpless enough, – he was particularly susceptible, she'd learned, when he was trying to suppress his emotions - for her to be able to lure him into snuggling on the downstairs couch after the children had gone to bed and the bar was closed.

Since the Geostigma though… no, since he'd found her in the church after she'd fought that remnant and Marlene had been taken… yes, since than, the touches had started to change.

Those changing touches of his were what was starting to drive her just a little bit crazy.

And she would swear he knew it.

It was in his impossible blue eyes when his fingers would 'accidentally' slid over her stomach as he reached around her to get something the children had asked for that she could have gotten herself just as easily. It was in the soft hum he made when he'd rub his lips over her shoulder sometimes when he was standing behind her and thinking over something they were discussing over the kitchen sink in the morning. It was in the edges of his lips when he would stand behind her when she was taking a delivery order on the phone for him and he would casually hook his thumbs into the waistband of her pants as he rested his hands on her hips and rested his chin on her shoulder, as impatient as any of the children for her to get back to whatever the family had been doing before the phone had interrupted it. Last week while she'd been mending one of Denzel's shirts in the evening, he'd laid down on the couch next to her while the children played a board game on the floor and he'd rested his head in her lap and gone to sleep. That wasn't new for them. What was new was that before he'd gone to sleep he'd turned his head and placed a soft kiss against the exposed skin of her stomach as casually as if he was kissing her forehead.

Kissing her stomach did an entirely different thing to her nerves than kissing her forehead did.

She'd almost stabbed herself with the needle. She'd certainly had an alarming moment when she'd forgotten there was anyone else even in the room with them before he'd turned his head and shut his eyes with that quietly smug smile and the children's chatter had found its way back to her ears.

Her eyes, staring unseeing out the window, narrowed.

She knew the man was doing it on purpose.

Her fingers began to tap against her arms.

The same way he'd taken to 'forgetting' his shirt in his room so that he had to walk across the hall without it on when he got out of the shower, a towel thrown over his shoulder and his hair wet and clean smelling and his bare feet making him ridiculously attractive for some unknown reason. Even worse, he'd stop to talk to her if he caught her nearby. And he _always _seemed to come out of the bathroom just as she was either coming up the stairs or coming out of her bedroom door. It was like the man _waited _or something. He'd _talk _to her. Cloud Strife, king of grunts and silence, would stop to talk to her about the most random and unimportant things, standing there with drops of water running down his long throat and amazing, bare chest, smelling impossibly wonderful and clean and male and wild wind, his low voice doing absolutely nothing to distract her from wondering how his usually warm skin would feel with the extra layer of cool water over it.

In the kitchen, reliving it now, Tifa grit her teeth.

That…that… _man_!

She still had no idea what she'd agreed to yesterday when he'd done that to her, just that afterward she'd been sure, as he turned to head to his room and given her a breathtaking view of his back and made her think how nice it would be to be able to press into it… she'd sworn she'd seen the glint of a mischievous smugness in those blue eyes.

That man! That Cloud Strife!

He was doing it on purpose.

Tifa folded her arms across her chest now and continued to glare out the window.

When he took her out on Fenrir now, and it suddenly seemed like there was always an excuse for him to need to, he always tugged her arm around his waist until she was curled around his back before he'd kick off and go racing the wind down the road. He still carried her up to her bed now when she fell asleep on the couch on nights when he was late coming home but now he stayed instead of going back to his own room. It didn't matter that he tucked her under the blankets and slept on top. He knew he was warm and she always kicked off the blankets and snuggled up against him in favor of that warmth whenever she fell asleep next to him. And even though he usually woke up first thanks to his years in the army, she knew the way they ended up tangled together after a night of sleeping that way was impossibly intimate and something they only let themselves get away with because their excuse was that they'd been asleep when they'd settled that way.

That man was taking advantage of her.

Tifa didn't know whether to blush or scowl or give in to the silly girly giggles she felt trying to get out past her chest. Instead she bent her head and rubbed her palm over her lips to hide the smile.

Cloud Strife was taking advantage of her.

Her eyes focused on the carrots in front of her and she gave them a thoughtful look. She had several hours still before the bar opened. Cloud would be back soon, bringing her back the sacks of potatoes she'd asked for. She made a snap decision and strode out of the kitchen to head up the stairs.

She'd put her hair up in one of those loose ponytails that Cloud always liked to take down and change into that shirt that always 'accidentally' slipped off of her shoulder.

_Then_ she'd go downstairs and make sure she was chopping carrots when Cloud got home.

Two could play at this game.


	12. Author's Note

_…this is an author's note…..it is only an author's note….since this is a real note these lines will be followed by important story information….I repeat….this is only an author's note…._

But dang, what a note it's going to be!

All right, I have got some serious treats for you guys, and while it's quite possible some of you have already seen them, I just have to cheer here too.

'Taking Care' has had not one, but TWO authors put in their hand at writing Cloud's POV! I'm so excited I'm bouncing in my chair (though that could be the caffeine). You peeps have got to check these out!

With a new look at 'mako eyes' and memories of a promise is ObsessiveCompulsiveValkyrie with '**Receiving Care**'.

And with a Cloud to make a psychiatrist proud and heartbreak on the horizon demonegg has posted up '**Skirts, Shoes, and SOLDIER**'.

We all know how difficult links are to post up here or I'd just post links but don't let that stop you. Go! Read! Seriously, both of these writers did really wonderful jobs and you won't be disappointed. Please leave them reviews too when you visit because we all know how authors thrive on those (they're yummy!).

_…we now return you to your regularly scheduled reading…thank you…_


	13. Chapter 13: Fighter

_this chapter is only because of, and definitely for, all my wonderful, instigating reviewers who insisted there was more that needed to be told from the last chapter. I wouldn't have written this without those reviews and it's both my thanks and my apology for not replying to all the wonderful reviews I've gotten over the last few chapters. It wasn't easy - I seriously had to drag Cloud out of the garage where he was 'working' on Fenrir to get him to take his medicine. In the end, I think he decided it was worth it though. Follow up to 'Seduction' because Tifa needed her turn._

**Fighter**

by TamLin

Tifa Lockhart was a fighter.

Cloud had always, on some bone deep level, recognized that in her. Even as a child there had been very little she couldn't do when she put her mind to it. Sometimes it had scared him as a child, that she could be so sure of something, so determined. Sometimes… it still scared him for the same reason. Tifa Lockhart was a clan lord's daughter even if her ancestor's might have never worn a crown or even owned more than a single roomed house and she'd break herself in half before she'd give up and surrender when she thought it was something important enough.

He couldn't think of how many times he'd found his strength in her, how many times he would have buckled under or shattered if it hadn't been for her steady and true and constant by his side, like a single dark star in a bottomless sky.

His star, with her eyes of fire and shadow, all moonlight and lovers whispers in the dark…

He blinked and looked down at the slip of paper in front of him, frowning. This would be three times he'd read it and he still had no idea what it said. He could understand the words, they just seemed less important to his mind than the fact that the shorts she was wearing were –

The soft sound grumbled in the back of his throat and he stared hard at the paper as she hummed and went about her monthly deep cleaning of the bar. Without his permission, his brain alerted his eyes and they rose again just as she bent over to pick up the rag she'd dropped. The soft shorts, well worn and tattered at their edges, clung to the curves she casually displayed, and his palms envied them with hot flushes that told him being curled around a boring piece of paper wasn't where they wanted to be. With a pleased sound, she straightened up and pushed her loose ponytail back across her shoulder, before tossing the rag over that same shoulder and wandering back around behind the bar again.

Cloud looked down at the delivery slip in his hands and tried to make it make sense.

Tifa Lockhart, independent, warm, laughing, loving, ass kicking Tifa Lockhart was teasing him.

And worse yet, he suspected she knew it.

The thought had the edges of his lips curving upward against his will as heat and tension coiled in his stomach and in his boots, he curled his toes briefly. He set the piece of paper to the side in the pile of the other ones he hadn't been able to read either and pulled over his logbook, picking up a pencil to tally the mileage he'd racked up in the past week. A chair scraped behind the bar and biting back a groan, Cloud lifted his eyes to see what she was doing now.

Apparently, it was time to take all the bottles down off the back shelf and wipe everything clean.

Which would involve both a lot of stretching upward and exposing the soft looking skin of her back and bending down to set things on the lower counter, giving him a view of just how soft and well fit to her those shorts she was wearing were. Meanwhile, the entire time, her long pale legs just seemed to go on forever… He made it through five bottles before the pencil snapped in his hand and he had to lean down and pick up the pieces from under the table.

He could have sworn, with his enhanced hearing, that he heard a snicker from behind the counter.

His eyes narrowed and he shifted in his chair as he straightened back up and glared at the logbook.

Technically, this wasn't new for them. He'd already helped her move all the tables and picked up all the chairs and stools for her earlier, the same way he always did if he happened to be home when the cleaning bug hit her. He was at the single remaining table going over his papers, the same way they always kept each other silent company when they both happened to be home, without the need for talk or direct interaction. It was enough to know the other one was there. Technically, Tifa always cleaned in old clothes and it was perfectly logical to do so.

She paused and raised a foot to rub her toes absently against the back of one bare calf and he had to swallow against his dry mouth. It was just a bare foot. He'd seen her rub the back of her calf with her opposite shoe often enough before. Why did it look like such a vulnerable move now? Why did it make him feel so protective – and aggressive? It wasn't helping that she had her arms stretched above her to hold the shelf for a small extra measure of balance.

He narrowed his eyes – and then she lifted down another bottle and both her feet were back on the chair but she was leaning over again.

With a low sound swallowed in his throat, Cloud gave in and stood up.

She was doing it on purpose. The same way she had worn that shirt that always seemed to find an excuse to slip off of one creamy shoulder or another. The same way she'd taken to putting her hair up in one of those loose pony tails that were always threatening to come down in a cascade of dark silk and yet never did, teasing him until he simply had to reach out and make it happen himself. The same way she'd taken to turning to face him with a question whenever he reached around her in the morning to put his empty mug in the kitchen sink and wrecked him for the entire day with the whispered brush of her body against his, eyes nothing but innocent as his mind blanked and he simply grunted in response to whatever words she was using that he suddenly couldn't hear anyway.

She was pure evil. There really wasn't any question about it. And it shouldn't make him have to stifle his smile the way it did as he walked over to her now.

Tifa Lockhart, fighter that she was, fought really, really dirty when she wanted to.

Of course, she wasn't the only fighter in the family. He was learning that from her too.

He'd taken off his gloves to do his paperwork earlier and he was glad about it now as he reached up and curled his fingers around the back of her exposed thigh. She started under his touch even though she'd seen him from the corners of her eyes when he'd come back around behind the bar and it made him smirk, just a little. Until she turned to him with that smile of hers that always stopped his heart and leaned down to hand him a bottle. The neckline of her shirt offered a glimpse she knew he couldn't take when her eyes were on him, sparking brighter than any of the red wines in her stock.

He felt the unexpected laugh bubble up in his chest and narrowed his eyes at her against it. She simply smiled that smile of hers as he took the bottle and reached up to get the next one down. Cloud was so busy staring at her exposed stomach so close to his mouth that she had to bump him lightly on the top of his head with the next bottle before he remembered to put the first one down on the counter and absently reached up for the next one. His hand stayed on her thigh and he spread his fingers to touch more of that pale, perfect skin. Her hand found the top of his head for balance when he did and it made him stifle another smile. Until her fingers absently combed through his hair and he felt the tantalizingly light scrap of her nails as she smoothed the impossible spikes back into place. Then he had to shut his eyes and inhale long and slow through his mouth.

Another bottle gently nudged him on top of his head and he was sure he heard a humming, muffled laugh this time.

It was a distinctly satisfied, feminine sound and one he'd never heard the woman above him make before.

He wondered what kind of sound she'd make if he gave in and ran his tongue over the bare skin in front of him. The thought made him smile as he reached up without lifting his head to take the bottle and set it aside.

That wasn't the way this worked though. Not yet.

Right now, they were flirting.

Not that anyone else would recognize it. Cloud realized that. There were no flirtatious looks or witty banter. No giggling, no clever innuendo. And he was glad. He would have felt like an idiot doing any of those. He wasn't a teen, in a way he never had been, and he'd entirely missed the way young men and women danced around each other, missed out on the basic building blocks of social interaction in so many ways. He'd been so shy during his youth he'd already been headed toward a stunted social life anyway. His years under Hojo's... 'care' certainly hadn't helped any either. There were huge gaps in the way he dealt with people. He wouldn't have had the slightest clue about how to properly woo the woman in front of him without looking like an idiot and being so uncomfortable he would have messed things up.

Luckily, she'd given him the secret to her heart years ago. The key to the lock.

Words weren't the only way to show someone how you felt.

The bottles were down and the shelf was clean, his hand on her leg 'steadying' her the same way her hand dropping to stroke through his hair from time to time 'steadied' her. He could smell cleaning fluid and faint traces of dust and flecks of liquor on her. He could smell the laundry soap and the fabric of her clothes. He could smell the soap she used, the lotion she used, her shampoo. And under all of that he could smell the warm, soft scent that was distinctly and only Tifa Lockhart.

He hadn't realized how close his nose had gotten to the dip of her waist until her fingers lightly bopped him on the top of his head and he opened his eyes to see nothing but pale skin. He didn't pull back right away and her body went very still in the shadow of his. She said his name and it came out a little bit broken, a little bit whispered and that sound made him smile and gave him the strength to pull back a little and reach down to hand her back up the first bottle.

When he had been little, all he'd ever really wanted was to be able to play with Tifa Lockhart.

He'd just never imagined the games would be this enjoyable.

He had to hold the bottle steady for her for almost a full minute before she managed to get her hand around it strongly enough that he wasn't worried she'd drop it, and he raised his face to her before he let it go, blue eyes feeling heavy and lazy as they found hers.

She almost dropped the bottle but he was still holding it and he felt the way the edges of his lips tugged upward again.

Tifa Lockhart could kick the ass of any man in the city. She handled two rambunctious kids that were too smart for anyone's good as if she'd done it forever. She could single handedly make Cid rub out his cigarette, Barret hang his head or Vincent smile with nothing but a look. She'd been the sweetheart of their village and probably every man's dream that had had the misfortune to look at her since. And she only – ever – went weak and vulnerable like this for him.

She wet her lips and he couldn't look away from the nervous little move.

"I think," she made a noise to try to bring some strength back into her voice. "I think I'll let the shelves dry before I put the bottles back up."

His eyes narrowed in thought and neither one of them moved.

That meant she'd be doing the stretching and bending routine again later tonight. The bar was always closed when she did her deep cleaning. He'd have her all to himself once the children went to bed. He nodded in thoughtful agreement.

"I've still got paperwork," he offered to keep her company while she did. The edges of her lips twitched now and he wondered how long she'd known he wasn't getting any work done. She made a humming sound and nodded a little. Her lips lost their battle and quirked upward.

"You can put the bottle down then."

He narrowed his eyes at her and could all but hear the laughter that shone in the sparks and dark depths of hers as he remembered he was still holding the bottle and set it down on the counter. Gruff, he reached up and she reached down for him at the same time, resting her hands on his shoulders. For a moment the teasing fell away and something warmer and deeper and familiar swirled between them. He watched her eyes soften and suddenly couldn't bring himself to play. His hands were firm and tender with her as he lifted her down from her chair and into his arms. She came with a soft sound and her arms stayed around his shoulders and wound around his neck as her body settled against the entire length of his. He enclosed her against himself and held her tightly. He didn't know any other way to hold her. Nestled against him, she was his soft, warm, dark star and the contentment pooled deep around both of them as he closed his eyes and relaxed. She burrowed in close, safe and knowing it, in his arms and that made him smile softly too.

This is why they could play with each other and tease, because of this safety and completion together.

He never would have been able risk making himself vulnerable to her possible rejection if it weren't for this. He knew it, and thanked the heavens for what had always been and yet what had grown between them.

Because… Tifa Lockhart loved him. And it was quite possible a part of him had always known it, even if it hadn't always been as obvious to him as the fact that he loved her in return had been.

He wouldn't rush this. Not after all this time. They deserved to be able to play. _She_ deserved to have someone play with her and make her laugh and feel young and carefree. But he wasn't going to hesitate, or let her hesitate, anymore either. If he'd learned anything from the geostigma, it was that everything was temporary – but some things would stand firm forever.

Her love fell irrevocably into the second category.

"Are you all right?" she asked softly against his throat and he made a low sound with a wry smile. Standing the way they were she couldn't miss what she did to his body and he reached up to tug her pony tail loose so that her hair fell down her back and he could stroke it. A brief pause in their game with its inevitable end they both knew was waiting.

"I'm all right," he told her with quiet humor. She was still stumbling over this type of 'game' between them, and her sweet hesitation and concern for him just made it sweeter for him. Not that he had any more experience in flirting than she did, probably a great deal less, but somehow each time she went weak and blushing and helpless for him, it just built his confidence and made him all that more determined to lure her past her own shyness. Tifa Lockhart, as sought after as her Corel wines, only melted for him. Just him. Only him.

Always him.

That obvious fact was enough to break through even his sometimes stifling self-doubt. The strongest woman he'd ever known and she turned to him for her strength and shelter. He couldn't help but rise to that need, each and every time she reached for him and that was one of the reasons he'd left when the geostima had started eating away at him, draining away his strength and his concentration. Because failing to be that for her, failing to shelter and protect her –

Seeing his failure reflected in her or the children's eyes… he would have died a thousand times alone in an empty church rather than see his failure in their eyes.

It was one of the reasons he'd stayed away and… when he'd found himself near her again, why he'd been unable to do anything but go when she sent him after the children. Better to die and not see her disappointment than live and know it was hiding in her eyes.

Somehow, she'd known that fighting would be like an elixir to him, that the more he did it, the more he'd need to fight what fate and the planet had done to him. Her spark to relight the all but dead fire in his own chest.

"Cloud…?" She whispered his name and brought him back to the present and he smiled and bent his head, rubbing his lips over her exposed shoulder with a hum to show he was still there, still with her. And then his blue eyes blinked in confusion and he raised his head. Her eyes were watching him, too sweetly innocent, and he pulled his lower lip into his mouth to taste –

"Cinnamon?" It was one of the only spices he recognized simply because he liked it so much when she put it on his toast. Her eyes were dancing, red opal sparks in liquid shadows and she shrugged that shoulder lightly, her hands curled on his shoulders.

"I might have spilled some this morning," she murmured. Sounding as if she was on the edge of a giggle. And Tifa Lockhart never giggled. He tried to fight down the way his lips curved and couldn't quite manage it. He tasted his upper lip with his tongue.

The woman fought dirty.

"On your shoulder?" he asked and got another shrug that threatened to slip the shirt entirely off her shoulder and, to his frustration, didn't.

"Among other places," she told him cheerfully. "I was very messy."

His eyes had just a second to go wide with the thought and then she was pulling away from him with a laugh and heading for the kitchen and hiding her coloring cheeks from him.

"The kids will be home soon from Myrna's. I should start dinner," she chirped and left him standing there with his fingers curling at his sides. It took almost a full minute for him to realize he'd started to grin and then he followed her into the kitchen.

Tifa Lockhart was a dirty fighter.

But she wasn't the only one that could be that way.


	14. Chapter 14: Snow

_and now a break from the more subtle Cloud__. Set during game time, right after the Forgotten Capital. If you have been asleep for the past ten years or so, this chapter will have a HUGE spoiler in it. Thank you biskitty for the setting ;)  
_

**Snow**

by TamLin

She couldn't feel her fingers, her toes… or her heart. All around her the wind howled and tugged at her clothes. Snow pattered against her exposed skin and she wrapped her arms tighter around herself, pulling the ragged red cloak that was over her shoulders closer around her frame. With each step she took, her boots made crunching noises in the snow. She bent her head against the cold and kept putting one foot in front of the other, following in the path through the snow that Cloud was breaking in front of her. It was cold even for someone that had grown up in the mountains.

She was so glad it was cold.

If she concentrated on the cold, she didn't have to think about anything else. She didn't have to think about what had just happened or who they'd just lost. Moving forward against the ice and snow and wind took up all her concentration, or at least enough of it that she could ignore the hollow place in her chest and the sick feeling in her stomach.

Aeris was dead.

Aeris was dead…

She blinked her eyes but it was against the snow that was catching and melting on her lashes, not because there were tears there. She had no tears. Her eyes felt like a desert and it bothered her. She needed to cry. Aeris deserved tears and yet… Tifa couldn't seem to give them to her. Happy, cheerful, flighty, determined, flirty Aeris… her death should be a release of warm water and sorrow but all Tifa could feel was… nothing. Her chest felt hollow and hard and her stomach felt cold and sick.

She'd cried for her mother when she'd died. She'd cried for her father. She'd even, when she was alone and lost and weak with recovery those first few weeks, cried for a burned Nibelheim and the last link she'd thought she had to a blue-eyed boy with hair like mountain sunlight. It was the years between that had taught her not to cry. At first she'd thought it was because tears made you weak and then she'd finally understood that it wasn't that tears made you weak, it was that they weakened everyone else around you. She hadn't cried since.

And yet now, when someone deserved her tears, she couldn't seem to remember how to give them anymore and somehow it seemed like such a betrayal. Aeris deserved her tears.

The wolves came out of the snow like ghosts but Tifa barely even lifted her head. It wasn't that she had a death wish or even that she didn't care –

It was that Cloud was systematically killing everything that got in his way, so quickly and efficiently and calmly that neither she nor Vincent had to move, or even had the time to think about moving before everything was dead and Cloud was trudging forward again as if he hadn't even noticed what he'd done.

She supposed it should have scared her and she didn't know what it said about her that it didn't.

She was glad Cloud was killing things.

In fact, she would have been perfectly content to sit huddled up in a ball in the snow, slowly loosing all the feeling in her body while he just killed and killed and killed the monsters that came out of the white. She thought… she thought he might have been comfortable with that too. They had Vincent with them though and Vincent kept walking forward and so they had to keep walking forward because he was behind them and so they couldn't stop.

When they reached the little village nestled in a mountain pass, it took Tifa a while to realize they had. She couldn't feel most of her face and her ears hurt even though she had the collar of Vincent's cloak up around them. She felt miserable and shivery and her brain felt dull. She followed Cloud up the stairs to the wooden porch and through the door into the inn simply because she'd gotten so used to following where he walked it was easier than stopping. Once he stopped though, so did she and the snow started to melt off of her boots and her hair and off the shoulders of the cloak, leaving slowly growing puddles of slush around her. A part of her felt guilty for making a mess but most of her just felt blank and empty. Blank and empty was comfortable though and she let it fill the hole in her heart and the hurt in her stomach until it clouded over and filled her eyes too. When Cloud started moving again, she didn't. It was nicer being blank and empty and still. If she stood still enough maybe the world would stand still too. Now that she wasn't going to die if she stood still, she thought she'd give standing still a try.

Until Cloud picked her up and threw her over his shoulder.

The noise squeaked out of her as her stomach made contact with his shoulder and for a long second she could only blink as what was happening filtered through her foggy mind. It took longer than usual but a great deal of that had to do with the fact that what was happening, shouldn't be.

Except it was. She had a very good view of the stairs below her, a red cloak in the way, Vincent's shoes, her hair and Cloud's back. Brows starting to come down she wiggled her arms loose of the entangling cloak. It shifted her dangerously on Cloud's shoulder but his arm was firm over her thighs and she couldn't find it in herself to worry that he'd drop her. Cloud wouldn't drop her.

Cloud would never drop her.

He would however apparently haul her up the stairs like some monster out of a fairy tale in front of who knew how many people. She braced her hands against his back to lever herself up and shot Vincent a glare for not doing something. Barret would have done something. Vincent, looking strangely thin without his cloak, just looked passively back at her. She sneezed. She rubbed her nose. Then she batted at Cloud's solid brick of a back.

"Stop it," she hissed at him, not as intimidated by him as she'd once been even if she still didn't always recognize him. He ignored her but she'd expected that. She was learning who he was as they traveled together.

"Cloud – " the thump on his back wasn't exactly gentle, even if it wasn't hard. It made her hand tingle as the blood started to circulate painfully back into her fingers. He grunted in response to show he was aware of her - and doing things his own way. She exhaled and threatened:

"I'll bite you."

"Not yet," his low voice was gravel as he finished the stairs and strode down the hall. "Vincent," he turned to toss the other man a key. Tifa got a shifting view of a nice cream-colored wall and a polished wood floor with a runner carpet down the middle of it. Vincent's gold shoes stopped following when he caught the key. Tifa propped her hands against Cloud's back again and levered herself up to watch the gunslinger unlocking a door with a big brass number on it.

Cloud kept walking.

The lost sound escaped her before she even though about it. Where was Cloud taking her if it wasn't to their guest room? Her mind couldn't find any logical answer and she sneezed again as her body continued to adjust to something other than freezing to death. Cloud unlocked another door and she watched the hardwood floor give way to a thick looking carpet. He shut the door behind him and tossed the key on a low dresser.

"Cloud…?" the question came out weak, voice giving her away before her mind could even catch up with it to understand why. She turned her head and saw –

her stomach tightened reflexively and her hands fisted in the fabric of his shirt against the small of his back.

They were in another room. A guest room. A guest room that only had one bed. A guest room that the rest of the party apparently wasn't going to be sharing. But – but - they _always_ shared a room! All three of them! Not two! Especially not two! _Especially_ not her being one of the two!

The panicked noise escaped her before she thought about it and her body automatically tensed to run even though she was still over Cloud's shoulder and incapable of the actual motion.

"Cloud!" his name escaped her in a squeak. Which he ignored as he walked into the bathroom – carpet changed to tile – and finally, _finally_ set her down on her feet.

In the tub.

And then he joined her and pulled the curtain closed.

"Wait – no! Cloud!" She braced her hands against his chest automatically as he reached past her, not even sure what he was doing, what _they_ were doing, but fairly sure they shouldn't be. What was - ? Wait! She didn't –

…_help_…?

The water came on and she made another noise and jumped as it hit her. His hand covered the back of her head and pulled her forward just enough so that she was against his shoulder and slightly sheltered from the sudden downpour by his own head. Behind them she heard the squeaks as he adjusted the temperature of the water. It – it hurt. Damn it, it hurt. She made a face against his shoulder and forgot to feel confused as the lukewarm water flushed over her through the red cloak and made her skin sting. His arms came around her, cloak and all, and held her against his own, much warmer form as the water continued to coax the blood back toward the surface of her skin. She sneezed again, violently this time, and he held her steady. For a long time, all she could do was huddle against him and shiver, body distinctly unhappy with the loss of numbness it had managed to find.

"I did not - I did not have frostbite - " she finally managed through her clenched jaw. She'd been a mountain guide when she'd been a kid, for Gaia's sake. It wasn't as if she didn't know what signs to watch for. He just grunted, still holding her tight with one arm while he reached past her to coax just a little more heat into the water. She finally shut her eyes weakly and gave up.

Cloud could be such an ass when he was being stubborn. She probably shouldn't think that so fondly.

Slow, he coaxed the temperature warmer, a long pausing degree at a time, and, just as slow, her body began to relax and then melt against him as the heat returned and then began to soak into her. He stripped Vincent's cloak off of her and then after a little bit longer, left her standing alone while he went to his knees and coaxed her shoes and socks off her feet while she rested her hands on his shoulders for balance. Her long hair fell down around both of them and clung like seaweed to his bare arms. His boots and socks joined hers, carelessly tossed outside the tub and when he stood up again he pulled her back tightly against him. It made her stomach flutter and maybe it was because the water was making her head fuzzy and relaxed or maybe it was that she needed to know someone was still alive or maybe it was just because it was Cloud but she reached up and wound her arms around his neck and shoulders and pressed her body close into his in response. His hands moved over her, tucking her tighter in against himself and she shivered again and it wasn't because she was cold. He stripped off his gloves and arm bracers without letting go of her and then dragged hers off of her wet skin too, adding them to the growing pile of wet clothes on the tile outside the tub. She rested her cheek against his shoulder and let him do anything he wanted. Because… it felt good. He felt good. And she was so, so tired of pretending he didn't.

He finally shut off the water and the steam hung in the air, soaking into her lungs. She felt drowsy and warm with little sparks going off inside her every time Cloud shifted the slightest bit against her. He wrung out her hair and the pleased sound slipped out of her before she could realize it and stop herself. He made a low, answering sound in his throat that might have been a smug chuckle or just might have been his own sound of contentment. Wrapping her hair around his fist with one hand, she felt him brace himself before sliding his other hand down to lift her. It was impossibly intimate but she was feeling so relaxed and boneless that when he lifted her, she trusted him and did what he wanted, wrapping her legs around his waist. His approving sound was her reward and he stepped out of the tub, letting go of her with one arm just long enough to pull a towel off the rack and wrap it around her before pressing her tightly against him again. She rested her head on his shoulder and let him carry her back into the bedroom.

He sat down on the edge of the bed with her still in his lap and reached up with the towel to run it carelessly over the top of her head. She gave him a narrow eyed look, peeking out through the soft fabric and, for just a split second, she was looking into the face of her bright eyed memory from Nibelheim. Cloud's blue eyes were crystal clear and laughing and the lines of his face had relaxed. Even his lips, usually just a hard, thin line, had softened and gone a bit crooked with a shy, playful smile. It was what she'd never thought she'd see again and she threw her arms around him so hard it knocked them both back over onto the bed. The playful ruffling of her hair stopped but his hands didn't and the towel was soft as he rubbed it gently over her. She lay on top of him and shut her eyes, not daring to risk another peek and find out she'd lost what she'd just seen, savoring that glimpse of the boy she'd fallen in love with so long ago. Finally, the towel stopped moving and his arms rested over her, holding her loosely but completely against him. He felt so warm and so solid and real that she found herself starting to fall asleep.

"Tifa…" his voice was so low it didn't disturb her drowsy state and she nodded her head against him to show she was listening without opening her eyes. Her chest didn't feel hollow when it was pressed up against his. One of his hands moved over her hair and that was new too. Cloud, when he did touch her, usually planted his hands as if they were growing roots and going to stay exactly where they were for the rest of time.

"You can't go to sleep in wet clothes, Tifa."

His voice was so emotionless and factual that it made her smile.

"Just for a minute," she argued sleepily. Because he was so warm and felt so good under and around her and she was so, so tired of being confused and miserable and lonely for him.

"No," he sat up, careful not to dislodge her and the way it made her body slid against his had her cheeks suddenly flushing and her brain kicking back in. Sometimes she felt so comfortable around Cloud, as if the distinction between their bodies was vague. He'd done that to her, broken right through any self-conscious barriers she had by simply, constantly ignoring them. Over and over and over again until she forgot they were supposed to be there in the first place. And then – there were other times… times that were growing just as quickly as the times she was comfortable around him when he confused her and made her body feel the most amazing, shocking things.

Like now for instance.

Suddenly she was very aware of the fact they were both in wet clothes that clung to them and the fact she was sitting in his lap in a way no good girl ever would. And, running a bar in the Midgar slums or not, Tifa still considered herself a 'good girl'. Cheeks burning and suddenly self-conscious and much, much more awake, she ducked her head and slipped off his lap, clutching the towel around her shoulders like a smaller, whiter version of Vincent's cloak. He watched her go and she was careful to hold her skirt down with her other hand as she stood but when she started to turn, his hand snaked out and caught her wrist.

His grip was like iron.

"No." Something in his voice was absolute.

Startled, she turned to look at him and found his blue eyes were hard and emotionless. He didn't let go of her wrist.

"Cloud?" She waited but he didn't say anything else and so she tugged her wrist lightly, towel clutched around her shoulders and over her chest with her other hand and explained: "I have to go change."

His head moved, a brief shake, and his eyes didn't leave hers.

"Not where I can't see you."

It took a long moment for what he'd just said to soak in. Her eyes went so wide there wasn't room for her cheeks to flush with color.

"What?!"

"Not where I can't see you," he repeated, voice just as low and determined as before and his brows, always low over his eyes anyway, started to come down even lower.

Her mouth went absolutely dry.

"C-Cloud…" she stumbled over his name and for a second the incandescent blue in his eyes flickered. His chin tucked just a little and his eyes left hers.

"I can't – " his voice was still emotionless but she thought, because she knew his voice so well by now, because she always listened so closely to him now, that there was something young hiding underneath it. "I can't let you out of my sight. I need - I have to know you're safe. I can't – " his hand had slipped from her wrist to hold her hand and his grip was tight. His eyes wouldn't look at hers. "I can't let you out of my sight because something might happen to you if I do."

And just like that – her heart broke.

She was used to him touching her but she felt much more unsure about touching him first. There was always that fear that he'd brush her off, even though he never had, or sit stoically and endure her the way he stoically endured so much. Hesitant, she stepped just a little closer. She reached out tentatively with her free hand and carefully, gingerly, stroked it over the shaggy hair that hung shadowing the side of his face. He didn't move and his blue eyes didn't flicker but she felt his attention in the coiled stillness. Still unsure but unable to stop, she sat down next to him, scooting closer, twisting her body a bit and tugged her hand out of his. He let her and his hand, now empty, stayed open and palm up on his thigh. His breathing was very carefully measured.

Gentle, she rested her hands on his shoulders and then slowly slid them around so that she was hugging him, holding him, even though he was unmoving and made of stone. She reached up with her fingers and stroked them through his damp hair, refusing to let go even though he wasn't moving and it felt awkward and her heart felt as if it would break if he pushed her away now.

"I'll stay," she whispered against the side of his head, tossing the last safety she had held around her heart away even though he'd never even know. "I'll stay with you."

It wasn't until she spoke that he moved, but when he moved it was as if something inside of him had just snapped and let loose something huge and rolling and unstoppable. His arms wrapped with sudden, desperate tightness around her and he hauled her roughly back into his lap again. This time both of her legs were on the same side of his hip though and she pressed into him, winding her body around his to hold him close in return. He bowed his head into her shoulder, she felt his face against her neck, and he made a sound in his throat that sounded like a stifled scream and a stifled moan at the same time, his fingers clenching almost painfully on her skin and the fabric of her clothes. It broke something inside her and suddenly - unexpectedly - the tears came. She twined herself as tightly around him as she could and she cried.

She cried for Aeris with all her plans about the future that were never going to come true. She cried for herself and how much she'd miss the first female friend she'd ever had. She cried for all of their friends who hadn't been there for Aeris' funeral and were never going to be able to see her one last time. She cried for a world that was suddenly a little less bright and hopeful, that meant, suddenly, just a little bit less than it had before. And she cried for Cloud and his broken heart that he wouldn't show except in that single, heart raw sound and the desperate way he held her.

She thought, just maybe, she cried for both of them when she cried for the lost flower girl.

She cried until she was finished, breaking down into the little hiccuping, shuddering sounds against Cloud's shoulder and he held her against him the entire time and didn't make another sound. Finally, finished and drained, she rested her cheek on his shoulder, eyes shut.

"Sorry," she whispered and his arms shifted to cradle her a bit more. He didn't lift his face from her hair. After a long moment though, what he said was:

"Your clothes are still wet."

For some reason it made her choke out a laugh and she leaned up to give his cheek a light, innocent kiss. The way she would have if Nibelheim had never burned and he'd never left and the darkness hadn't taken both of them the way it had since then. Rubbing at her eyes, she sat up and slipped off his lap again and, under his golden bangs, his blue eyes watched her closely.

"Turn around," she told him with a weak smile. "I'll dry off and change by the chair if you'll promise not to look."

Any other man would have teased or flirted or made a promise he didn't mean. Cloud just nodded in all seriousness and turned around on the bed to cross his legs in front of himself and stare at the snow piling up against the panes of glass. Tifa looked at the back of his head and felt hopelessly, helplessly the way she had fallen in love with him. Him, as he was now, as much as him, who he had been. How had he managed to capture her heart so quickly - again? Shaking her head sadly at herself, she went over to where he'd dropped their backpacks near the door and found clean clothes, which she changed into after she'd dried off. She sat down on the bed behind his back afterward and started to brush her hair out.

"Your turn," she told him softly and felt the bed move as he got up and went to his own pack. She tried to concentrate on her hair and not the fact that, whether she could see him or not, there was a naked man in the room with her. A naked Cloud Strife in the room, no less.

What was she doing?

What in Gaia's name was she doing?

What would her father think if he was still alive?

Her eyes suddenly flew wide and she made a hiccuping noise.

What would Vincent think? What did Vincent already think? Cloud had tossed the other man the key to a separate room and hauled her off to a different one and – her hand clapped over her mouth and she felt her cheeks go brilliantly red.

It wasn't that she thought Vincent would think less of her. The silent gunman had a way about him that said he wouldn't look twice at you if you sprouted an extra head. And it wasn't as if she was worried he'd spread gossip about her. It was just – it was –

She and Cloud weren't doing… _that_. What they did in private was strange and impossible for anyone else to even begin to understand – she didn't understand it most of the time herself - but… that was in private. It was mortifying to have someone think that she was… that she was that type of girl. That she was doing… that.

Cloud appeared in her field of vision again, a safely dressed Cloud, and gave her a mildly questioning look. She gestured with her brush to him and then the door and then made a wide sweeping motion to include the room. The very edge of his lips shifted the smallest bit upward and one of his blond brows rose slightly. She wasn't as intimidated by him as she'd been in Midgar though and she gave him a glare. He knew exactly what she was talking about!

With a soft growl, she thumped the brush on the bed next to her.

"Vincent's sleeping in a different room," she told him as calmly as she could and he gave her a dry look that asked why she was pointing out the obvious. She narrowed her eyes at him, refusing to buy his 'innocent' act. "We're not. What is he going to think? What if the others get here early? What are they going to think? What do all of those people downstairs think? Cloud – "

His eyes had gone a lazy, thick blue as she protested and the very edge of his mouth was starting to hook upward in something she recognized as one of his devastating smirks. With movements too graceful and smooth to belong to anyone that wasn't a SOLDIER, he shifted onto the bed to kneel in front of her, eyes on hers.

"They'll think 'lucky guy'."

"Cloud – " she managed weakly. She was trying not to let herself be overwhelmed by him, she really was. She'd gotten better over the time they'd been traveling together. But she was still astonishingly helpless against him when his eyes were this way and so intent on her. She fought the instinct that had her wanting to scoot away from him for her own peace of mind – because he'd just follow. He'd already showed her that in the past. And then he surprised her because his eyes softened, just a little, and he reached out and pulled her up against him as he tumbled back to lie down on the bed.

"They'll think you're mine," he clarified calmly, reaching out to flip the blankets up over them and then his arms banded tightly around her as he pulled her into his body. His voice was muffled by her hair as he flatly repeated: "You're mine."

It made her stomach take that wicked, twisted dip that only he could make it do and her hands fisted in the fabric of his shirt before she could even think about resisting him. Against her better judgment, she inhaled the wonderful electric and storm wind scent of him where her nose was pressed into his throat.

She should protest that she wasn't his. Except… she was. In her heart, she thought she might have always been and even if he didn't know it, or didn't even care… it was true. Cloud Strife might never belong to anyone but himself, but her heart… it was his, even if it never mattered to him.

With an exhaled noise, he settled himself more completely against her and his body relaxed a little. His arms around her didn't though and she wondered just how long it would be before he would feel safe letting her out of his sight.

He certainly hadn't minded letting Vincent out of his sight.

"You didn't have to let Vincent think that," she chided drowsily against his skin, knowing she should be protesting _this_ and not what Vincent would think of this. It was just… it felt so good and she was so comfortable… It was too late to change any assumptions Vincent might come to anyway her mind told her. She might as well enjoy this moment while she had it. Cloud made a low sound in his throat in response to her words. It sounded surprisingly unfriendly even though she knew that he and the silent gunman got along astonishingly well.

"You were wearing his coat."

Her eyes blinked open, lashes brushing against his throat in surprise.

"I was cold. He was being nice."

Cloud didn't move against her and his low rumble simply repeated factually:

"You were wearing his coat."


	15. Chapter 15: First Time

_This was for an LJ battle to chose the One True Pair of the FF series. It's easy to guess who I threw my hat in the ring for. The prompt was 'first time' and the Cloud in my head said 'we're doing that one'. What can I say, he's got a weird sense of humor._

**First Time**

by TamLin

"Tifa…" his low voice held a hidden, yet, to her, distinctive rasp. For someone that didn't talk much, he always managed to put an awful lot of meaning into her name each time he said it. And right now his tone said he'd do anything to please her… and that he wasn't at all sure about whether he could at this particular moment.

"It's okay," she reassured him, moving her hand over his, one of their private ways of communicating that she was giving him permission, in fact, asking him 'please do' and, despite himself, he made a quiet sound in his throat in automatic response. Cloud might not talk much but he was in no way silent, if you knew what to listen for. It made her smile and she shut her eyes briefly as, under hers, his long fingers started to move with more assurance, even if there was still a guarded hesitation. It made her smile softly.

In front of her, she felt his concentration sharpen. He was so… sweetly serious about this it almost made her want to laugh. And to cry. Because it was obvious this was his first time and as much as it made her – so stupidly proud it was with her, another part of her was reminded of how much time, how much of his life, he'd lost to mako tubes and torture. And then to hunting down a planet destroying madman. And, just recently, burdened first heart and then even physically by geostigma and guilt...

"Tifa?"

He could pick up on her moods even faster than she could and she opened her eyes and gave him a smile. Which quickly transmuted to a grin as his hand under hers shifted and his fingers, long, clever – dangerous – fingers, took up a different rhythm. She hummed her approval and had to stop herself from leaning forward to kiss him.

"Even better," she told him and his electric eyes, blue on blue, lifted under his shaggy bangs to find hers, just a little shy. It made her heart catch, the way that look he only ever gave her always did, and then his eyes went back to concentrating on the way he was moving his fingers. She inhaled and watched his lips flicker at their edges at the sound.

"You're sure I should be doing this?" he asked but his voice had lost the hint of trepidation and he sounded vaguely… fascinated.

"Oh, very sure," she agreed and his eyes lifted to hers again. His fingers shifted suddenly, strong and sure of themselves and wound her own through them, drawing her down into the moist dampness and she had to blink and lock her jaw against the sudden blush again. She was supposed to be teaching him. She did this herself all the time… as if reading her thoughts, his low voice dropped a note.

"I like it when you do this better."

"Cloud…" she chided and his thumb slid over her knuckle, leaving damp and liquid behind. Eyes on hers, he lifted her fingers, now as coated as his and very deliberately sucked the moisture off of her index.

"I like it when you do this better," he calmly repeated. "I like to watch."

The room had already been hot but suddenly it was so much hotter and she felt herself go red all the way down her throat. The brush of his tongue on her skin had her stomach going weightless and her joints went weak.

"Cloud…" her voice came out much more breathless than she was comfortable giving away and she saw his smirk in response. It gave him temptation's own eyes.

"Besides," he reasoned in that impossibly attractive, impossibly reasonable voice. "Shouldn't you be teaching Marlene how to do this?"

She had to swallow as his lower teeth absently scrapped her knuckle.

"Boys-" she made a little noise and pulled in a breath. With extreme effort she pulled her brows down at him and sent him a glare, more because he knew what he was doing to her than at his suggestion. "I already taught Marlene. She can take care of herself. But boys should know how to do this kind of thing too."

"Then you should definitely teach Denzel," his calm eyes were watching her but she caught the wicked laughter trying to hide in them. She tried and lost the fight with her own laughter as she reached out and gave his shoulder a push with her free hand that didn't even rock him back on his heels.

"I'm already teaching Denzel. But right now I'm teaching you, Cloud Strife. You can't live off of grilled cheese sandwiches for the rest of your life when I'm gone for a couple of days. Now stop stalling. You're supposed to be learning how to cook and right now the mix needs more flour."


	16. Chapter 16: Home

_another short ficlet I did for Kimouski's Final Fantasy OTP War. This one is partially demonegg's fault because her Cloud set me off on the concept of 'home'. set during game-time._

**Home**

by TamLin

He'd dreamed, once upon a time, of coming home to her. When he'd still been young and so much more naive. In his daydreams, he would come home from work (his idea of where he worked was vague but he knew that it would be a good job, one he could be proud of)... He'd come home through the cold mountain air or the early spring rains or the long forever summer evening and see the lights on in the windows of his house and know she was there. She'd come out when he came in the front door, stepping out of the kitchen or the living room or coming down the stairs and she'd smile – just for him – and it would make her eyes fill with light and his heart lift in his chest. She'd want to know how his day was or he'd ask about hers or she'd just smile and laugh and turn and he'd follow her into whatever room she'd just come out of. It didn't matter in his dreams. Just that she would be there and she'd be there because she wanted to be with him. It always filled him with warmth and peace, imagining that golden scene in his head. In his heart…

The dream grew more solid after he left Nibelheim. The smell of a home cooked meal would follow her out of the kitchen if she was there. Sometimes she would look surprised to see him, as if she hadn't expected him home yet and her eyes would fill as she smiled for him. Because she always…_always_... smiled for him in his dreams…

Sometimes, as he'd gotten older, she'd greet him with soft arms and needing lips as soon as he came in the door…

It didn't matter how she met him. Half asleep sometimes, it didn't even make sense how she met him. It was that she always met him. Always opened her arms for him. Always smiled.

Always made his heart feel warm and safe inside his chest as the gold glow of the fantasy wrapped around his mind.

He'd lost that dream. Somewhere during those years of poisonous green and screaming and forgotten humanity, of voices whispering inside his head and his heart dying by inches while more and more light was forced into his eyes… he'd lost that little safe home where she waited for him with a smile like tender kisses against his soul.

Even when he'd found her again, he hadn't remembered. It had been gone. A ripped apart, impossible ghost dream.

Until the night he came back from blowing up the first reactor. Barrett had been in the process of being loud and obnoxious – his usual - and he'd been ignoring him – his usual. He'd startled a little girl when he'd come back into the bar the group he was with used as their base and then…

And then she'd come over to him. Left where she was and come over to him and, if the smile had been shy and a little hesitant instead of brightly open, it had still filled her eyes with light. He'd felt his heart constrict in his chest so painfully it felt as if someone had just ripped it out. Or suddenly, after all those years, made it start beating again. He'd felt a tremble move through him and for a brief, impossible moment, the world had been full of gold light and her soft face and a feeling he'd forgotten inside his chest.

She'd said something, he'd said something. It hadn't even mattered. Barrett had exploded back into the building. Ordered chaos had returned. His money had beckoned as everyone went to the hidden room below the bar.

Everyone but her.

Everyone but her and the foreign, inexplicable golden warmth in his chest. He'd followed her without a thought, finding himself at the bar across from her and again, she'd given him that shy, soft, pleased, hesitating smile and he'd felt the hole open up in his chest.

Because he had suddenly understood why something inside him was crying. He'd ordered a hard drink to try to drown it but nothing would. Because, seeing that smile in her eyes, he had finally remembered.

He'd remembered what he'd really lost. And what he was never going to be able to have for himself. Because he was only transient.

And she'd never want to welcome him into any home she would one day create.


	17. Chapter 17: Starting Over

_this one is the fault of mom calling and her last review. I wouldn't have had the idea to write it otherwise. Just a fic to answer '_Home_'. set directly at the end of ACC._

**Starting Over**

by TamLin

He stood outside the door and told himself to breathe.

_Just – _

_breathe…_

The geostigma was gone. Sephiroth had been sent back to wherever the hell he'd come from in the first place. The remnants had all been wiped out. There were no more Summons lurking in narrow alleys or blowing up parts of the city. No more bits of Jenova loose.

_At least as far as we know. Rufus doesn't exactly win any prizes for sparkling honestly…Overdramatic twit._

The rain had put out most of the fires.

The world was free to return to its ordinary madness. He and his friends were all heroes.

_Again. Whoopee… _

He was a hero. Whether he wanted to be or not. A hero should be able to handle this, he told himself.

_Just breathe, Cloud. This isn't that hard._

_idiot_

He frowned at the closed door and shifted the pillow under his arm.

So much had changed. So much. He stared at the wood of the door.

Just… knock. Just lift your hand and knock.

He exhaled instead and shut his eyes for a minute, resisting the temptation to simply thump his forehead against the surface of the wood instead.

This shouldn't be this hard.

Her eyes… _Gaia_…. What her eyes had done to him earlier today at the pool in the church…

He needed to concentrate. He needed to focus on what he was going to say. He needed –

_her…_

_damn it. I just need __**her**__._

His hand was twisting the doorknob and pushing the door open before he had time to think about it. The same way his bare feet carried him silently into the room without the need for instructions from his head.

She was sitting on the small indent of her window, somehow making herself tiny enough to fit the awkward space. The only light in the room came from that window and it painted her long, pale legs and her bare arms in running colors of blue. She was so beautiful she made his throat go dry and her loose hair, like liquid shadows, slipped over her bare shoulders as she turned her head to look at him in surprise. Eyes as black as stars widened and then moved down to the pillow under his arm before flickering back up and looking at him a bit wider still.

A perverse part of him wanted to grin at that look.

_I do that to her. Just me._

_idiot_

_she's adorable when she's off balance._

_don't push it, Strife._

_no… do push it…_

"Tifa…" he said her name because saying her name was the one thing in his life that had always made sense. Her eyes softened at the sound of it and she unwrapped the long, pale fingers she'd had twined around her upraised legs.

"Cloud?"

His heart inhaled the sound of her voice on his name and he dropped the pillow on the bed as he walked around it to join her. She was already in her nightclothes, already smelling of soap and lotion and mint. It was late after all. Everyone had wanted to celebrate.

All he'd wanted to do was hold his family in his arms and tell the rest of the world to fuck off.

Instead he had a downstairs full of disreputable characters they called their friends sleeping off booze and adrenaline and a guy with a gun for an arm sleeping on the floor in between the children's beds in the room next to this one.

_life isn't really that bad._

The thought made him smile, just a little, and when her fingers flickered in the dim light, he reached down automatically to take them in his own. They felt delicate and frail and infinitely strong and capable. He rubbed his thumb over the tips of them and heard the soft sound she unconsciously made. Felt the way her fingers tightened around his and, after a moment, the way she leaned, just a little, to rest against his side as they both looked out the window.

_I love you…_

_idiot_

The silence between them was soft and comfortable and the rain continued to slip down the glass of the window. He had always been better at confessing at night. Something about the dark softened him or his defenses or just his stiff, awkward tongue. Without looking down at her, he very quietly stated:

"I want to sleep here tonight."

Her head came up in surprise and she looked at him but he tucked his chin and refused to meet her eyes. Feeling –

_I sound like a little kid…_

_I sound like I want something more than just sleep._

_I do want –_

_shut._

_up._

"Cloud?"

He didn't answer her. Couldn't answer her. He'd done so much, hurt her in so many ways through the years. He didn't have a right to ask what he was. Didn't even have a right to want to ask it. Not anymore. But he asked. Because he couldn't stop himself anymore. Because none of the reasons he shouldn't ask were strong enough anymore. Because…

because he needed her too much. And he couldn't risk losing it all again. Couldn't risk losing her.

He'd learned that from the geostigma and the remnants at least. He – they – didn't have forever.

All they really had for sure was right now.

Waiting until things were finally right, meant waiting one last breath too long.

Her fingers moved against his and he looked down to see her watching their linked hands.

"For – " she cut herself off and he watched her gather up her courage and lift her eyes to his. In the dark, they were full of whispers and wishes.

"For just tonight?" she asked softly and there were layers and layers in her soft voice. He didn't try to look away from her eyes. Instead his lips briefly pressed together and then he quietly confessed:

"For always?"

He watched something in her break and it was beautiful and slow. Her mouth softened and, shyly, began to curve. Hope and hurt warred in her eyes, belief and mistrust. He deserved that.

He deserved a hell of a lot worse.

"Promise?" it came out of her heart and tore his. Because it was so young and so reluctant and so sweet and so feminine and helpless and vulnerable. He lifted their linked fingers to his lips and, gently, almost shyly, kissed the tips of hers. Because, in a way, they were starting all over again. Again. He pressed his hand against the cool glass of the window, hers trapped between the heat of his skin and that chilled surface. As if he were trying to touch the stars that were out there beyond the rain. Stars that had heard another promise so many years ago. He leaned down, just a little, and slipped his free arm around her waist to pull her up. The windowsill was too thin and she had nothing to support her but him.

His eyes didn't leave hers.

_nothing more beautiful in the entire world… or the worlds beyond this world…_

"I promise."

And she believed him. Even though he didn't deserve it. He saw it slowly drawing all the light in the world into the depths of her beautiful eyes. She believed him.

He gathered her up into his arms and it was awkward at this angle and right and she wound around him, completely trusting and accepting.

He would never, not in his most shining moment, deserve her. Deserve this.

He was tired of letting that stop him.

The bed gave a little bit under his weight as he settled down onto it, reminding him of how much trouble he and Barret had gone through to find something nice for her, even if they'd pretended, when they'd brought it home, that they'd just picked it up somewhere random. Embarrassed to be caught doting on her. She'd known anyway even if only her eyes had given it away. Slowly, laying back on it now, he thought they'd done a good job finding a comfortable bed.

_better than mine._

_I hate my bed._

_it's small and flat and – _

_and lonely…_

_Like hers much better. Like her being in it better._

She made a soft, content noise when he settled down and he let her slip off of him.

_not yet… _

_soon though._

For tonight it was enough that she was in his arms, in his bed

_her bed._

Their bed. It was enough that she didn't move out of his arms. It was enough that she turned and tucked into him and her arm slipped over his chest. Enough to feel her breath against his skin and feel her warmth and the press of her body through the thin fabric of his t-shirt and loose night pants.

It was enough and it was more than he deserved.

"Cloud?" it was a murmur, a sigh, a whisper and he made a humming noise in his throat to show he was listening. She didn't say anything else though and it made him smile. Her breathing started to slow as he stroked fingers softly over her hair and, when he was sure she was asleep, he turned his head and pressed a kiss to her forehead. Because he had heard what she had really said when she'd said his name. And in the dark of the night, he exhaled his answer.

"I love you too…"


	18. Chapter 18: Love Song

_yet another ficlet from the OTP war. Yep, I ended up with an even half dozen. It's amazing what trying to keep your girl out of the nefarious clutches of a KH character will do to motivate you to write. So here we go and I'm going to set this around ACC timewise.  
_

**Love Song**

by TamLin

It was one of those silly old love songs that had been popular when she'd been just a child. Full of soppy sentiment and sweet words. She'd memorized it, of course. What little girl, dreaming of heroes and a love that didn't pay attention to time, wouldn't have? She couldn't remember the number of times she'd fiddled away on her piano until she'd finally worked out the piece… how many times after that she'd played it in the evening, fingers moving over the keys until she didn't even have to think about it anymore. It was a good thing her father had been gone so many evenings or she probably would have driven him mad with the repetition of those notes, that song. Thinking back on it now, it made her feel just a little bit silly and relieved that no one had been subjected to hearing how often she'd played that single song…

But still, when it came on the radio while she was working a new layer of polish into the counter top of her bar, it made her pause and sigh in the empty room. Remembering how she'd loved the song, remembering how she'd loved the way the song had made her little girl heart feel…

And, since she was alone, with no one to tease her for being silly and soppy and sentimental, she let herself sing softly along with it, smiling to herself as she smoothed circles over the reflective surface in front of her. The music filled the bar and filled her memory and wove a soft place around her heart.

Oh… she'd been so young and so naïve…

She didn't regret not being that little girl anymore but sometimes… sometimes she missed her…

The last note died away with a bittersweet sigh and she sighed too and stopped her work, just for a minute, to lean forward onto the bar and enjoy the lingering, already fading emotion.

And then Cloud stirred from where he'd been leaning against the door and her eyes started up, wondering how long he'd been there.

He walked over and shut off the radio and she watched him, torn between embarrassment that he might have seen her going young and silly and hoping, because his face was so relaxed and calm, that he hadn't seen it at all. Until he very gently drew her around and into his arms. Lowering his head just enough to rest his cheek against her temple he began to slowly move them in a lazy pattern across the floor behind the bar. And, soft and without missing a single note, his low, throaty hum began to repeat the song.


	19. Chapter 19: I Know

_yet another OTP War ficlet. Set post ACC._

**I Know**

by TamLin

He was running late.

It wasn't exactly a new concept for him. It was even a bit of a familiar joke with Tifa. That wasn't the point though. The point was that he was running late and he wasn't going to get home before it was dark and the children were already in bed.

He'd managed to stay on time enough to see them off to bed for a full week and a half. And now he was going to break that streak.

It bothered him. It bothered him deep down where his guilt lived and as each minute passed it rubbed him a little bit more raw there. He knew it was foolish to feel guilty for something he couldn't control - the ferry breaking down - but he did and no matter how hard he pushed Fenrir the fact remained. He was going to be late getting home.

Finally, he conceded the point and pulled to the side of the long winding road to dig out his cell phone. There was only one number in it that called him regularly and that, just recently, he called regularly. Or fairly regularly. Or at least often enough it was the only one in his 'sent calls' memory. He still didn't like talking on the cell phone.

She picked up on the third ring.

"I'm going to be late." Inwardly he winced at how bluntly it came out but he couldn't think of any other way to say it.

"Oh..." she paused and his heart took a lurch at all the things she didn't say afterward that he thought she should. He deserved it. After a minute she added with a bit more brightness in her voice. "It's okay. I'll save you some dinner for when you get home and I'll make sure there's enough hot water for a shower for you. I'll send Denzel out to pull the garage door down but we'll leave it unlocked for - "

"Tifa," he quietly cut her off and she went silent on the other end. She didn't have to act cheerful. He knew what he'd done to her when he'd left because of the geostigma. He knew forgiving and forgetting were two different things and while one was easy for her the second wasn't for anyone. His emotion rumbled behind his low voice as he told her:

"I'm coming home tonight."

For a very long time it was quiet on her end of the phone and when she answered the emotion behind her voice loosened the bands of iron around his chest and actually made the very edges of his lips turn upward the smallest bit. And all she said was:

"I know."


	20. Chapter 20: Bad Day

_for everyone I haven't thanked personally yet for reviews, I'm sorry. The internet's been down at work and there's where I steal most of my online time ;) This is also from the OTP War. It's a little bit futher in advance than I usually write in the timeline but I'm going to set this one somewhere before DoC simply because by the time Dirge rolls around I get the impression Cloud and Tifa are already there. I'm firmly of the opinion Cloud learns from his mistakes._

**B****ad Day**

by TamLin

It had been a long, hard day. He wanted something warm to eat, his bed and a shower. It didn't matter what order they came in. His face felt dry and gritty from the blown sand, his leather rubbed uncomfortably through the fabric of his shirt and his hair was plastered against the back of his neck and his forehead with the remains of his dried sweat.

Most days he enjoyed his job. He loved speed and he loved Fenrir and he loved being outside. His job gave him the excuse for all three. And, on a deeper level, he loved being able to do something for other people that didn't involve having the fate of the entire planet resting on his ability to kill someone. He loved fighting. He hated killing other people - save one. He'd never quite lost the sick feeling it usually left in his stomach.

Delivering packages across a vast expanse of land that most people didn't feel safe traveling though made him feel useful. Seeing the smiles, hearing the pleased and surprised sounds… that made him feel good. Most days it was enough.

And then there were days when nothing went right and he really did wish he could kill certain people and being outside meant enduring the miserable weather.

Today had been one of those days.

The light was just starting to fail as he reached Edge and the shadows were already long and swallowing by the time he reached the little street that turned down to the place that always called him back. With motions so practiced he didn't have to even pay attention, he slipped Fenrir to the side of the building and dismounted. The door to the small garage/storage/laundry room was already up. She always made sure it was up for him if she knew he was on his way back.

It counted as extra indulgence on the days she did it when he was coming back in the rain.

He dropped his bike's kickstand and reached out to pull down and lock the garage door. He always locked it even though only someone that was entirely out of their mind would even think about trying to steal this particular bike out of this particular garage. He ran a gloved hand over his face roughly and felt grit on his skin. His eyes felt dry behind the goggles he hadn't gotten around to pulling off yet.

Food. Shower. Bed.

What had she said she was making for dinner tonight, he wondered as he pushed the door between the garage and the kitchen open. Something with noodles. He still didn't recognize most of the food she made. He just knew that it always tasted delicious.

Noodle Something… Noodle Supreme? Surprise? Sunset? His boots fell heavy as he stepped into the kitchen. They felt heavy. He was going to fall into his bed and act like he'd been hit with Stone Stare and everyone had run out of softs.

Which was when the door between the kitchen and the rest of the house burst open with enough force to have his head snapping up in defense. He caught a blur of black and peach and suddenly Tifa's body was impacting with his. He staggered back and hit the jam near the garage door with a grunt and that was about all the time he had before her mouth was over his.

Under his goggles, his blue eyes went huge.

Her arms twined around him and her body pressed into his and – he groaned at the things she was doing with her mouth to his. Instinctively, his arms came up around her and his fingers fisted in her hair without him even thinking about it. Responding to her was as natural as breathing for him and the kiss she had started accelerated rapidly as he got involved with it too. Soon there were grunts and gasps and clothing was falling to the floor with almost fierce determination. Dimly, in the back of his mind, he was aware that the bar must be closed. That the kids were with Elmyra this week. And that Tifa usually only got this throw down, knock out aggressive for a few very limited reasons. Despite himself he started to smile as his hands slid under her to scoop her up so she could wind her legs around him.

"Bad day?" he managed and her mouth found his again.

"You have no idea," she answered; breathe like fire against his skin as he lifted her.

"Good," he mumbled against her mouth, as he stumbled for the living room. "Mine too."


	21. Chapter 21: What Dreams May Come

_I've been wanting to do something with the Kingdom Hearts version of Cloud from the first video game for a while now. Never having played the game my knowledge is limited and I'm feeling unrepentant about that. Since Kingdom Hearts is an AU than I suppose this is an AU of an AU. Or perhaps it's entirely just for Final Fantasy VII instead. Either way, here we go. It's not at all what I had in mind originally and I'm not quite sure how it went over. Set just before the beginning of FFVII._

**What Dreams May Come**

by TamLin

When Jessie mentioned her dream lover Tifa couldn't help standing up a bit straighter. They weren't the best of friends but they were the only women in a rough and tumble group of men and if they didn't have enough in common to be friends, solidarity in the face of unequal odds proved enough. Still, they didn't talk about personal or intimate details often. In fact, they might never except for those nights when Jessie got herself just a little bit on the plastered side (well, they did operate out of a _bar_) and tended to forget to feel restricted in front of Tifa. Tifa, perpetual bartender with all the expected willing ear and shoulder necessary, never minded listening to the other woman while she cleaned glasses and Jessie sipped at her drink. Jessie never got thoroughly drunk. She just got… lonely sometimes. Tifa understood lonely and they all dealt with it in their own way.

So when Jessie mentioned the words 'dream lover' Tifa's ears perked up invisibly and she turned her head to look at the other woman as she continued to dry the mug she was working on. Jessie sighed and rested her cheek against the arm she had folded on the counter top.

"He's sweet and strong and he doesn't brag about big things he's never really going to do," the redhead's voice was drowsy and she closed her eyes with a little smile. "He saves me when I'm in trouble and he tells me how pretty I look. Me… pretty." She smiled at the thought and didn't open her eyes. "He's got nice eyes too. Really, really nice eyes…"

Tifa waited but the other woman didn't continue and so Tifa edged a little closer and asked hesitantly:

"What color?"

"Hmm?" Jessie sat up a little and looked over at the bartender with lazy eyes. Tifa shifted a little, toe of her boot tapping against the back of her other calf and repeated:

"What color are his eyes?"

"His eyes? Oh," Jessie focused for a minute and then frowned. "I don't know. Something pretty. He'd have pretty eyes."

"Oh." Tifa said it softly and her shoulders sank a little but she smiled gently at the other woman as she moved over to set the mug down and pick up the next one. Jessie hadn't been talking about what she thought the other woman - hoped the other woman - was talking about. Because… Tifa knew what color eyes her dream lover had.

Blue.

They were an impossible blue.

She knew they were blue because she saw them almost every night.

The night of Jessie's talk about a dream lover was no different. Tifa closed down the bar and got everything and everyone settled for the night and then she finally ran though the short routine of getting ready for bed herself. It had been a long day and she fell asleep almost as soon as her head hit the pillow.

She opened her eyes when she heard the heavy tread of his footsteps on the stairs.

If she could hear him than it meant he'd had a hard day himself. His body had a way of radiating his emotions. Which helped because his face so rarely did. She knew he could walk quietly but most of the time he walked the way he did now. With heavy, tired steps.

He had a way of breaking and filling her heart at the same time.

The door to her room pushed open but it wasn't the door she'd closed. The same way the bed she was in wasn't the bed she'd fallen asleep in even though it was unmistakably, somehow, hers just as much as the room. In her dreams, she always started off in the same place.

His head was bowed as he came in, face almost hidden in the cowl of his cloak. She knew that position and she sat up in bed, pushing the blanket back a little. She wasn't in the worn shorts and loose top she'd fallen asleep in. Instead she was in a tank top that was close but not the same as her daywear and the skirt was red. The same way the fingerless gloves she wore here were red and only came to her elbows, lacking the extra fighting gloves she so often wore in the slums. Here she was softer. Softer and, she'd found to her not entire surety, she was more feminine here.

She wasn't used to being safe enough to be feminine. _He_ made her that way in this strange dream world they shared.

His head came up when she moved and he inhaled. The ridiculously huge sword he carried across his back as if it were an afterthought was suddenly unslung and he propped it against the wall as he approached the bed. Because it was him, because she was dreaming, because – here – it was all right, she shifted onto her knees and held out her arms for him. He made a noise as he all but collapsed forward into them, a quiet, throaty, humming sound of relief and need. It pulled the edges of her lips upward even as it hurt her heart and she buried her face in his hair and held him close against her.

He smelled like sun baked sand and dust and blood and shadows and black lightening.

His arms didn't rise to wrap around her but he leaned a bit harder into her. It pulled a stifled laugh out of her as he almost tipped her over and in response he hummed again, sounding, just a little, as if he were smiling.

Reaching up with one hand, she dragged her fingers through his hair. Golden hair. Soft golden hair with the most alarming set of spikes framing his face she'd ever seen. Only once…

Only once had she ever known anyone that had hair that might have been close to competing with the rampant spikes of his.

That hair had been gold too…

She knew why the man in her arms now had gold hair. The same way she knew why he had breathtaking blue eyes. In her head, she even had a name she called him.

But he wasn't fourteen and if there was anything innocent about him, she'd never seen it.

She was a long way from Nibelheim. Even in her dreams, she was a long way from Nibelheim.

There were nights they stayed this way all night long but tonight she smelled the blood on him and so she pushed him back just a little. He went but the way he did so indicated he was only letting her move him and if he'd had other ideas they would have been doing things his way instead. That had used to frighten her at first. Waking up in a strange bed and dealing with a strange man who was so much more dangerous than anyone she'd ever dealt with before.

Because, somehow, she recognized that, to her, the blond with her now was even more dangerous than the man that had burned her home to the ground, slaughtered her father and almost killed her. How fitting that the man in front of her now had started showing up in her dreams during those first fever sick months following that waking terror.

That had been almost four years ago.

He hadn't left her dreams since.

He watched her as she stayed resting on her knees on the bed, as she reached out and unwrapped the cowl of his ragged cloak and drew the entire blood red mess off of his shoulders.

His wing came free as she did.

Wings… what kind of strange make up did she have in her subconscious that she had given him wings? Or rather, wing. Just one, and that like an ornate bat's, though she knew from experience it felt as soft as suede. If he used it to fly, she'd never seen it. It seemed more to be another extension of his emotions – the ones he never showed on his face.

He had used to shy away from her touching that wing.

He'd gotten over it.

She caressed it with her fingers now and his shoulder on that side relaxed. Just a little. Almost as unnoticeable as his sighed exhale and the way his glowing blue eyes closed briefly.

His eyes hadn't used to glow. Not when he'd first started coming into her dreams in this strange place that was hers and yet wasn't. The same way he hadn't always had the wing.

Or the golden clawed glove.

Four years had seen quite a few changes in the way he looked and moved. It had seen changes in just how much heartbreak her heart had grown to be able to bear as well. Light, she stroked his cheek and his eyes found her face. She saw a rueful wryness in that blue and it made her own lips curve in answer. Gentle, she leaned up and kissed his forehead and in answer he ducked his head and kissed her throat.

They never went far. Something inside both of them seemed to hold back and Tifa was never sure if it was a whispered 'not yet' in her head or a 'it's not really him' that stopped her. She didn't know what he heard in his own mind but there was always a chain around him as well that seemed to stop him. Sometimes… when he looked at her, she saw the distrust in his own eyes as well and she wondered who he thought she was and what she looked like to him if he looked so much like a broken promise to her.

She couldn't ask. There were no voices in her dreams of him.

Or his dreams of her. Sometimes she wondered which of them was dreaming and which was the dream.

His teeth scrapped her throat and made her stomach jerk in weightless reflex. Sometimes he left marks on her. They were never there in the morning when she woke up. She just felt them all day long.

She shut her eyes and sighed his name, though all that came out in the world of their dream was a low murmuring sound without meaning. He heard her anyway and knew that she had named him even if he couldn't hear it. Because his voice, low and just a little bit raw, moved his lips like liquid fire against her throat as he said hers. A mumble, a murmur, but she recognized the sound of her name even if the dream wouldn't let her hear it with anything more than her heart.

She wondered what name he really said when he was like this with her. She wondered what name he thought he heard her say…

She wondered when she'd stopped thinking of him as nothing but a dream and started thinking he was real.

Gentle, she pushed him away again and, reluctant, his lids low over his eyes, he let her. Barely. Some nights he didn't let her push him away and she didn't know about him but she would wake up from those dreams tense and nervous and breathless and straining toward something she didn't understand. At almost sixteen, it had been confusing and a little frightening. Luckily, at that age, he hadn't been as aggressive as he'd grown over the years. At almost twenty, she understood a great deal better thanks to the area she lived in and the things she saw. It was too late by then though. She'd already learned to melt for him.

Reaching up now, she started to unbuckle the numerous belts and fastenings he wore. He wasn't dripping blood onto the stone floor the way he sometimes did but she still wanted to check and make sure the blood she smelled wasn't his. At almost sixteen it had bothered her. Now the only thing she thought when she smelled blood on him was the hope that it wasn't his.

Far too often, it was his.

It had made her rearrange her priorities.

As usual, she grumbled over the number of fastenings he was wearing and as usual, he made sounds in his throat that were barely discernible chuckles. The iron shoulder pauldron came off and landed on the bed next to her first and the various leather straps followed the way they always did.

She didn't know why he always let her do this. He had to be capable, even with the metal claws on his off hand, of doing it himself since she never saw him in the morning and each night the straps were back in place again. She just knew that it had started the first time she'd clipped her chin on his shoulder plate when they were both younger because he'd hugged her too hard one night. He'd been impossibly devastated over the blood on her chin that she'd already known wouldn't be there when she woke up and the next night he hadn't gotten anywhere near her. It had left her so lonely inside her heart that the next night she'd jumped him as soon as he'd hesitantly opened the door and taken the shoulder armor off immediately just so that she could hug him. The pattern had started and over the years they'd never changed it.

She knew to be careful with the razor sharp plates on his dominant hip and thigh and she peeled off his golden claws last, making the same noises she made every night at what they'd done to the pale, callused skin of his fingers.

Some nights there was blood between the claws and the skin. Some nights, it was even his blood. Tonight wasn't one of them.

Without the extra gear, his outfit looked surprisingly like a SOLDIER's. But that didn't surprise her. If he was going to wear the face and form of her lost promise, why wouldn't he wear the clothing she'd expected to see?

It was his turn to gather her into his arms then, now that he was just warm, solid flesh, stripped of all his cold, hard armor and the sharp edges of rending metal. His heart beat against hers through their chests and his fingers knotted in the fabric and flesh of her, tangling strands of her hair along with them. She found him again with her arms and held on tightly.

There was always at least one hug like this during their nights together. A hug of desperation and need and familiarity. Two children in adult bodies clinging to each other because…

Because they were all either of them had left. Everything else was gone. Every last familiar landmark and touchable memory and familiar voice. All gone forever. He was all she had left that she could call 'hers'. Really, always, truly, only just 'hers'. She clung to that, and him, even though she sometimes wondered how horribly pathetic it made her, clinging to something she knew was only a pretend of what she knew wasn't even there anymore.

Except… he always held her just as tightly…

Still holding her, he joined her on the bed, careless as he knocked the armor and leather and cloth out of the way. In his arms, the change began.

He had grown a wing and a man's body through the years.

She'd learned to glow.

It was a soft light. It reminded her of nothing so much as moonbeams reflecting off her skin. But it stayed no matter how she turned or what shadowed over her. In his arms, her skin glowed a soft, white light.

He hated the dark.

In response, her dreams had taught her to be a light for him. Now he only had to touch her to set her skin warming and radiating under his touch. Pulling her down onto the bed with him, he buried his face in her pale, moon-colored skin and exhaled. His wing came forward and covered them both. Protection. Privacy. Careless of the fact they were both still wearing shoes, that he was filthy, that they had only just greeted each other, the sleep overtook both of them.

They didn't meet at night to spend time together. They met each night because it was the only way either of them could find true sleep.

They met because the nightmares outside were too strong to bear alone.

One night, maybe soon, Tifa knew that she wouldn't wake in her dreams in an empty room listening to boot steps coming up the stairs. No woman could live her entire life in the arms of a dream.

What she didn't know, couldn't know, was that she would lose him only to find him again on the other side of waking, wingless and confusing.

And still, somehow, completely, only just hers.


	22. Chapter 22: Rain

**Rain**

by TamLin

"Cloud?"

Her voice was soft from the doorway and he turned to look at her. The rain plastered his hair to his face and caught in his lashes. It wasn't a gentle rain either and so the wind pushed and tugged at the cloth and leather, at him. The icy drops bit his exposed skin. It felt…

"Mm," he made a noise to show her he was aware. In the moment and paying attention to her and not lost somewhere else inside his head. But he didn't move out of the storm. Her lips shifted upward in amusement but her eyes held worry and confusion.

He was used to that look. It was one of _his_ looks. The looks that only he ever got.

The thought made him smile, just the slightest curve of his lips.

He liked the fact that he actually had 'looks' that were just for him. Even if most of them were a mix of amusement and concern. It was the affection, that warm, rich, complete love that was always mixed in with the looks she gave him that made him so proud to be the sole owner of a score of Tifa Lockhart's 'looks'. Rain trickled down the back of his collar and he shivered. He didn't move to join her in the doorway though.

"What are you doing outside?" she finally asked and that made his lips twitch too. Instead of scolding him, she was asking why he was doing what he was doing. He couldn't explain what it meant to him that she asked instead of assumed, that she cared about the why as much as the what when he did things. He finally let her presence lure him closer and took the two steps that brought him to just where the edge of the roof kept the rain from falling. He didn't want to lose that rain and the feel of the storm. Not yet.

"It's raining," he told her, lifting his face to squint at her through the falling water where she stood on the raised stoop of the entry, white toes of her sneakers peeking over the lip. It reminded him of her as a little girl. Her lips moved, pressing together. Exasperation and laughter. Another look that was his… but that he sometimes had to share with the children.

"Yes," she agreed, amusement in her voice. "It is. And you're standing out in it getting cold and wet."

It made him smile, just a little bit wider, and the wind took that moment to buffet at him and then dashed past to puff at the hair around her neck and face. She retreated just the littlest bit from the cold in its touch. But she didn't abandon him, even if it was his own fault he was standing out in the storm. She did laugh though.

"Cloud – " the sound was exasperated but not impatient or annoyed. She crossed her arms at him but it wasn't her 'you're in trouble, mister' gesture. It told him that she wanted to hug him but he wasn't close enough or she didn't think the timing was right so she folded her arms in on herself instead. She didn't know that he knew her secret about that gesture. But he'd realized it at the newborn pool in the church last month when he'd been surrounded by children and life and laughter and hope.

He'd realized a lot that day.

"Sometimes… we could hear the rain." He hadn't used his voice all day, customers content with his grunts of acknowledgment and now it came out a bit rusty. The rain hit his tongue when he spoke and the cold felt good against the heat. "Not the nice, gentle showers. It was only when it stormed, when it was violent enough to reach through the pipes and the stone. Sometimes, when they'd put me in the mako tube to repair what they'd done, I would dream and I could hear the rain. But I could never feel it." His voice was soft and thoughtful as he added: "I learned to hate not being able to feel the rain."

She made a noise, a little lost sound, and he realized what he'd been talking about. Or rather, she realized what he had been talking about. He blinked at her through the rain as another gust pushed at him, trying to push him inside the house. And he'd let it. Just… just not yet.

He wanted to feel the rain.

"Is that what woke you up this morning?" she asked softly and he liked the way her voice sounded when it was the way it was now. Soft enough for him to sink into. That was one of the voices she only used on him and the children too. He made a low sound.

"This morning it was screaming. When it started to rain on my way back here, I remembered how much I had liked hearing the rain."

Now that they were sleeping together, even if it was only sleeping and not _sleeping_ the way he wanted to, she got to suffer through his nightmares too. He'd gotten good at not making noise when he had them and waking himself up before they got too bad… but he still had them. She somehow always knew when he was having them, even when he didn't move. Not as much now though. Since she'd let him move into her bed, he didn't have them nearly as often at all and they didn't cling to him all day long the way they'd used to. Her arms around him were stronger than the nightmares.

She'd always been stronger than his nightmares.

She made a soft sound then, one of the sounds she only made for him, and suddenly she wasn't in the doorway anymore. Because she was wrapping her arms around his ribs instead and standing in the storm with him. The smile came again and he lifted his own arms and wrapped them around her, bowing his body forward so that he could keep her safe and warm in the shelter of his. She burrowed in closer, fingers fisting on the fabric of his shirt against his back, nose finding the warmth of his throat. That made him smile too and he shut his eyes while the rain battered them.

She was going to get wet. But it was okay. She was from Nibelheim too and she could handle a little cold. It wasn't as if he was going to keep her out here for long.

The point was that she was here now. With him.

Across the street, weathered eyes peered through the curtains to squint out the window again. Behind her, her husband of fifty years made a querulous sound.

"What are you doing over there, Mabel?"

She gave the window a scowl and sniffed for effect even though Hubert's hearing had been going for years and the noise would be lost on him.

"It's those crazy kids across the street again," she told her husband. "Don't even have the sense to come in out of the rain."

~*~*

_A.N.  
_

_happy Independence day, all :) hope I don't jinx the fireworks with this_


	23. Chapter 23: Something Borrowed

_I've been busy in other areas, like finishing my Tales Within Tales fic and so I haven't had the concentration for one shots the past couple of weeks. I'm feeling a bit rusty because of it and I'll be the first to admit this isn't one of my smoothest shorts. I do apologize for the quaility but hopefully the thought counting will earn me some grace. And - hopefully - it will get me back in the saddle again at least. I have quite a few half finished ideas that need finishing for this collection. This one however was a mix of Mia who asked for a 'motherly' Tifa and a spin off from a different idea I've got roaming around in my head for Sector Six. It's set perhaps a month after ACC as things are starting to settle into new patterns._

**Something Borrowed**

**by TamLin**

"Tifa?"

She made a noise to show she'd heard but didn't try to back out from under the sink where she was battling with a drainpipe. Like so many other mild nuisances, Tifa had kept meaning to mention this one to Cloud… and forgetting it in all the other more important things that came up each time he was home. Finally, this morning, watching the water drain after she'd washed her face… and drain… and drain… and drain… she'd gotten sick of remembering and forgetting and decided to just take care of the darn thing herself.

She'd fought Jenova spawn for pity's sake. How hard could taking a drain off and unclogging it be?

"Can I play with Cloud's jewelry?"

Marlene's voice was bright and cheerful. The little girl, like so many children with busy adults in their life, was very good at entertaining herself. But, like so many children with busy adults in their life, who also happened to know they were loved enough to be confident and on the fearless side, she had a knack for being everywhere and finding everything.

"Sweetie, you know you're not supposed to be in – wait." Tifa set down the crescent wrench and backed carefully out of the small space under the cabinet. "What?"

Marlene made a face and promptly dropped down on her knees to crawl over to where her guardian was crouched. Squinching her nose, as if that was going to help her concentrate or divine some ethereal truth, she looked into the cabinet where the flashlight was spotlighting the pipe in question.

"Cloud's jewelry. Do you think he'd mind if I played with it? Denzel and I are going monster hunting in the basement and I need an armlet for protection."

It made Tifa smile and she brushed her bangs out of her eyes with the back of her hand. She'd been wrestling with the stubborn pipe, trying to find the chancy balance between using enough strength to twist the stubborn seal off without using too much strength and twisting the entire pipe off.

Sometimes, she wondered how Cloud managed it all the time.

"The armlets are in the bottom drawer in my bedroom. You know the wooden box. You and Denzel can both take one if you make sure to put it back."

Marlene pulled out of the cabinet and looked at her. One of those affectionate, 'you just don't get it but I love you anyway' looks that was too adult for such a young face and never ceased to make Tifa have to bite the inside of her cheeks to keep from grinning.

"I don't need a real armlet. It's just the basement," she explained to the other woman. "There aren't _really_ going to be any monsters."

Tifa tried to bring her eyebrows down in 'seriousness'. As if she'd really let her children go off and hunt real monsters but Marlene was so sincere in apparently thinking she would…

"I just need some pretend armlets. Cloud's got pretend armlets and I want to use those. They're prettier."

'Pretend armlets'? Tifa ran through it in her head, wondering what Marlene was really talking about. Cloud didn't have much in the way of knickknacks – and even less in the way of jewelry. As far as she knew he had the wolf stud… and maybe the original ball stud for his ear… though she doubted the latter. If it wasn't on Cloud – or a weapon or a bike – he tended to lose it and not even notice. Other than that the only jewelry she could think of might be the wolf on his shoulder plate or the rings he'd given each of his family back before the geostigma incident. Marlene had given hers to Barret but Denzel and Tifa still wore theirs.

"I don't think Cloud has any… pretend armlets, sweetie," she told the little girl and Marlene nodded vigorously.

"Yes, he does. I saw him with them once. Back before… before he left," the little girl whispered the last bit as if afraid someone would overhear or, more likely, as if speaking the words out loud might call the situation in again. Their family was healing but it was still a fresh enough wound that they were all a little shaky around it. Her voice returned to a normal level as she chirped. "They're really pretty and they jingle when they move. I want to jingle."

Tifa finally focused entirely on the little girl in front of her and sat down, crossing her legs in front of her. Cloud had given her all their unused armlets. So that left…

"Bracelets? Do you mean Cloud has bracelets?"

"Mm hm," Marlene's nod was sure and her smile was bright. "Pretty ones. Do you think he'd mind if I borrowed them to play?"

Tifa felt her heart flicker then. She only knew of one place Cloud, short of buying them for himself, would have gotten bracelets.

There was only one woman she knew that had ever worn anything as frivolous and feminine as bracelets. Bracelets that fit better around wrists used to flowers and prayer than worrying about whether they would get tangled up on creatures tusks in battle or jingle and give them away while they were trying to sneak through Shinra.

"I… don't think we should without asking him first, Marley."

Picking up on the change in Tifa's tone, Marlene ducked her head to meet her eyes.

"Is it 'cause they're 'special' bracelets?" she asked and neither of the women even pretended 'special' had anything to do with magic or materia slots. Cloud's 'magic' was the sentimental bits he kept close to his heart and guarded with privacy and silence. Tifa nodded thoughtfully and Marlene, brows down, nodded back. After a moment of silence, Marlene reached out and caught at Tifa's wrist, a move she'd learned from her. So was the bright smile determined to push away any lingering darkness.

"Come on, Tifa. You can come down into the basement with us. I'll be the monster and you and Denzel can hunt me."

It pulled the laugh in a burst from her guardian and with only a single glance at the stubborn pipe, Tifa consigned it for a later time that day and let her charge pull her out the door and down the stairs. The children were her balm as much as she was their security. No matter what… she never doubted their love for her or her standing in their hearts.

Even if they did both end up ganging up on her as 'monsters' and wrestling her to the ground while demanding donuts for her freedom.

Tifa was in the process of serving her customers leftover fresh baked donuts with their drinks when Cloud came home that night and in the rush and rumble of the children she forgot about the bracelets for a little while. Or rather… didn't forget so much as push them to the side…

Tifa, over the course of her life, had gotten very good at not thinking about things she didn't want to. It was part of how she defended herself and her heart. It didn't mean they weren't there, eating away at the back of her mind… it just meant she refused to let them come to the front.

Her habit had almost cost Cloud his sanity once…

It had cost her during the geostigma too. She was trying to be better, do better, since than. Trying… trying to confront things that bothered her instead of pretending they didn't and trying to ignore them. It wasn't easy. She didn't like confronting emotional things. It… it hurt. She shied away from intentionally hurting herself, even if burying things usually only meant it hurt more in the end. So she washed the dishes after she closed down the bar and she frowned into the soapsuds and she tried to work up the nerve to ask.

About something as silly… as important… as bracelets.

By the time she drained the sink and shut off the downstairs lights, she was determined. She'd ask, light and trivial and no matter what the answer… at least she'd know. By the time she passed the children's door and checked in on them, she'd decided she'd just hint at it and let it go if he didn't pick up on it. By the time she got to her bedroom, she was sure she'd put it off until breakfast tomorrow and by the time she reached her bathroom, to find Cloud on his back, half buried under the cabinet, she decided it wasn't really that important after all.

"I was fixing that," she told him gently, leaning her shoulder on the door frame and he grunted from under the sink. A year ago that would have been the end of that, but his sense of humor was healing the same way the rest of him was and his voice, dry, came from the depths of the cabinet.

"I'm fixing it faster."

It brought her lips up in the smile that only he could pull out of her and she folded her arms across her chest at the warmth that rose there. Cloud liked taking care of them. He liked taking care of _her_.

"I would have fixed it already but there were monsters in the basement."

Another grunt but this one held laughter.

"Were the monsters about so high and the reason we had donuts for dessert?" he asked and the quiet laughter was in the edges of his voice too. His hand gestured vaguely for the 'so high' and she laughed. Loving this… this new _comfort_ they found with each other. They really were becoming a real family.

"They might have been," she nodded and then her smile faded a little. Catching at the warmth and comfort in the room, she borrowed courage and, before she could rethink it, told him:

"Marlene wanted to borrow the bracelets you have in your room. She said they were prettier than the armlets we have and that they jingled."

He went suddenly still under the sink and she forgot to breathe. He was trying to get her to be more honest about the way she felt, being his usual quietly coaxing self and she was trying. She knew it was important for both of them. That he relied on her words to show him the way as much as she should say them to let him know what she was thinking. But… it was moments like these that made her think it was better to hide what was going on inside herself from him. How important were the bracelets really? He was with her now.

Slow, almost cautiously, he pushed himself out from under the cabinet and sat up to look at her. She saw that 'little boy' look in his eyes. The one he got when he'd been caught at something and didn't expect it to go well. Even Denzel couldn't do that with his eyes the way Cloud did. His lips pressed together as he looked at her and then he asked quietly:

"Did you see them?"

"Mm" she shook her head, mouth tightly shut as well and he slowly nodded, looking down. Then she watched his eyebrows come down and he pushed himself to his feet in one smooth, dark motion. His jaw was set in determination and somehow, it made her stomach sink.

She shouldn't have said anything…

"You should see them," his hand caught hers as he strode past and she found herself pulled in his wake, suddenly confused and dreading.

"I don't have to," she protested, as they crossed the hallway between their rooms and he just kept going. "Cloud…"

He shook his head and pulled her over to his messy desk.

"I promised no more secrets," he told her. As if it was something she was expecting him to hold to. When she hadn't even known he'd promised it. He pulled open the top drawer of his desk and when he did, he let go of her hand. She found herself suddenly feeling adrift and out of place. Metal chimed against metal as he dug it out of the bottom of the drawer where it was hidden under papers and log books and accounting files. Cloud wasn't the most organized but he lived so sparsely it was hard to tell.

She cupped her elbow with her other hand and waited. Telling herself it didn't matter. Because, in a way, it really didn't. It wouldn't change anything between them. He made a low noise and turned to her, glints of gold in his hand. She was confused to see pink whispering over his cheeks though and he held the hand out for her, eyes deep blue and still waiting to get chided. Without thought, she took the metal from him and looked down at the round circles. For a long minute, they didn't make sense.

In the silence, he rubbed the back of his neck and looked down at his feet.

She lifted her face to him.

"These aren't Aerith's," she stated weakly.

"Hm?"

Tifa held the slim gold bands in her hands and looked down at them. For some reason, her vision blurred and she felt her chest go tight.

"These are mine," she whispered and felt him shift guiltily in front of her.

"Yeah."

Blinking, she managed a smile and looked up at him. He returned the gaze, peeking out at her from behind the shelter of his shaggy bangs. She sniffed and then laughed.

"I thought I lost them years ago. At Don Corneo's. I thought…"

He was looking very intently at her feet now and as she watched he scratched at the back of his neck again.

"Cloud…?" she began softly and he made a noise in his throat.

"Cloud," she stated a little sterner, starting to feel a smile and trying to fight it. He heard it anyway in her voice and his blue eyes slipped up sideways to look at her. Whatever he saw had the edges of his lips starting to curl upward as well.

"You stole my bracelets?"

His shoulders shrugged but the crooked smile didn't leave the edges of his lips.

"You left them with the dress," he told her. "I just – pocketed them. And forgot to give them back later on."

Laughing, she slipped them onto her wrist and listened to the thin bands jingle against each other.

"They're just painted tin. I bought them for nothing when I bought the dress." Walking over she rested that hand against his chest and wiggled her wrist so that the metal chimed cheerfully again. "You didn't have to save them."

He relaxed at her teasing and at her touch and very gently his arms went around her, fingers locking together against her back. His eyes were softer as they moved over her face.

"I wanted something," his voice was softer too. "And," his shoulder moved. "They were yours."

It melted her and she stepped closer so that she could wrap her arms around his ribs and settle in against his chest. They were still getting used to casual touching. But, like communicating, they were getting better at it. His arms wrapped more completely around her and he lowered his head to rest his cheek against hers. For a long time, they stood that way and it was everything and it was enough. Then, the hint of teasing laughter in her voice, without moving, Tifa whispered:

"Did you steal anything else of mine?"

The choked sound Cloud made in his throat would have been answer enough even if the color spreading across his cheeks hadn't given him away.


	24. Chapter 24: Because the Kids Say It's OK

_so today is Cloud's birthday - at least fictionally. Since I did a Tifa fic for her birthday, how could I resist one for Cloud? That said, this fic didn't go at all the way I'd planned. I wanted to do a jealous Cloud fic because I've read some pretty decent ones in the past (granted there are some pretty bad ones too but I've enjoyed Sekihara Tae and Qwi-Xux for instance) and it just seemed like too much fun to write. Cloud however had different ideas (I think 'game-time Cloud' is influencing 'after ACC Cloud' - and worse yet, somehow Tifa isn't complaining) and he only wanted one thing for his birthday. What's an author to do? As demonegg has pointed out... 'if you give a Cloud a cookie...' I believe this takes place about a month before 'Bad Day' in my timeline and shortly before DoC in the SE timeline. Happy birthday, Cloudy._

**Because the Kids Say It's Okay**

by TamLin

Tifa was a bar tender. Cloud understood that.

She was also an incredibly sexy-beautiful-gorgeous-generous-warm-soft looking-ass kicking-devastating-innocent-exotic-curve in all the right places–drive a man mad-take all the pain away-gentle-possible biter if roused the right way-tender-motherly-certainly**_ not _**motherly-Gaia, why is she with me?- woman.

Cloud understood that too. Really, really well.

Men were visual creatures with too much confidence for their own good when they got drinking.

Cloud understood that as well.

So while Seventh Heaven had become much more of a 'family friendly' establishment than its predecessor, it still had a bar and that meant it still had men who came in to finish their evening off drinking. Most of the men were regulars who knew enough to look but not touch and to be careful about even looking when a certain blond haired swordsman was in the room. Cloud didn't blame them for wanting to look and he didn't even blame the ones that lost their minds and fell in love with her.

It was hard to judge a man harshly when it was the same problem he had – especially since he'd had it longer than any of them and wasn't even thinking of fighting the addiction anymore.

It didn't mean he liked it and it didn't mean he didn't make it a point to let his disapproval show when he deemed it necessary.

Unbeknownst to him, the 'family' atmosphere of the place had increased while the 'drinking establishment' one had decreased after he'd made his decision to start making it a point to be back home by sunset every night.

Now he was sitting at his usual table in the corner, nursing a drink, plate empty of food next to his elbow while he looked over the map and delivery notes in front of him and figured out his route for the next day. His sword was propped against the wall behind him and he hadn't taken a shower yet. He'd gotten into the habit of washing up but saving the shower for just before he went to bed. Tifa always took her shower before she went to bed so that she could wash the smell of smoke and alcohol and cooking out of her hair and after accidently discovering she tended to need to comb her fingers through his hair when it was wet, he'd quickly taken up the habit too. Even if it meant he used cold water and the kid's bathroom while she used the one that let off of her room.

That was definitely going to change soon.

In the meantime though, he behaved himself. Which included distracting himself with delivery routes instead of shower fantasies that would only end up frustrating him. Blue eyes focused on the map in front of him and he mentally charted lines across it. He enjoyed seeing how straight he could make the lines between points and how much he could fit into one of them before he had to make an adjustment in another direction. It was a challenge to see how much time he could trim. Which didn't mean he didn't sometimes take the long route just because of somewhere it would pass through.

A warm hand fell on his shoulder and he felt the soft touch of a kiss laid on top of his head. It made his lips shift upward at their edges automatically and he made a soft humming sound in his throat as Tifa slipped away, taking his plate with her, a full glass of cold water in its place. When he knew she had her back turned, he lifted just his eyes, mako bright under his shaggy hair, and watched her walk away.

She put an extra sway in her hips and he knew she'd caught him anyway.

Despite himself, he smiled as he looked back down at his paperwork and traded the drink for the water. All day on the bike dried him out. Even though he'd never mentioned it, she somehow knew anyway.

He finished plotting his route and finished his water at the same time. Accomplished with one thing, he set the pencil down and buried his chin in his fists as he rested his elbows on the table. His eyes, finally not hiding what they were doing after years of pretending otherwise, automatically found and traced the barkeep as she wound her way between tables and behind the polished bar. After the geostigma incident, he'd promised himself he was done hiding, done pretending, done stalling.

Done letting her stall.

Tifa, for all her ability to pile drive a man through three floors and a basement if she wanted to, was almost painfully shy in certain areas. It had taken him an unforgivable amount of time to realize it. She was so open and friendly and giving, it was easy to miss the fact that she could be too giving. Which meant she would bury her own wants and needs and feelings in favor of someone else's and that when it came to what was really deep and guarded inside her heart, it was almost impossible to get to her admit to something. It was as if she were too used to disappointment to give her desires acknowledgment and therefore the ability to hurt her by failing. Her real emotions reminded him sometimes of one of the miniature key deer that had lived in the woods near their village when they had been children. Elusive and shy and prone to run and hide at the first sign of danger to them.

Small and frail - and impossibly trusting and soft if you could coax one close enough to touch.

His mother had taught him to lure the key deer out with lumps of sugar and patience. As his eyes followed the woman behind the bar, he was grateful to his mom for unwittingly teaching him about so much more than tiny red deer.

Tomorrow was his delivery day to Wutai. He went once a week, always on the same scheduled day. He'd picked one in the middle of the workweek because that was when Seventh Heaven was slowest in the evening. Before the geostigma, he had stayed the night in Wutai and then come back the next day. Since the geostigma he'd taken to pushing himself and Fenrir and making it home at the crack of dawn the next morning. It was running him ragged but he found he hated sleeping in a strange bed.

Possibly because it was a strange _empty_ bed.

The thick soles of his shoes rubbed absently against the wooden floor under the table and his brows came down. He was getting very tired of only sleeping when the bed wasn't empty next to him. It was getting very hard not to take advantage of how snuggly she always got first thing in the morning if he woke her up early. Especially hard because he knew she wouldn't hold it against him if he did. Except…

Except.

Except there was too much in their life together that just 'happened'. Too much that was more the result of a coincidence or situation than a real and determined choice on their part. He wasn't protesting. It was what had gotten them where they were. But he wanted her to know it wasn't 'just because' or an 'oops, well, let's just take it from here' type of thing when he finally committed entirely to her. It was vitally important – to him – that she know and understand and never doubt.

He'd given her too many reasons to doubt already and not even realized it most of the time.

It was something he'd been giving a lot of thought to for a while now.

Across the room and over the top of the bar, she cocked an eyebrow at him and he realized he must have been scowling at her unintentionally while he both stared and worked over the problem in his head. Since he'd never in his life, to his knowledge, actually scowled _at_ her seriously - in response to her teasing didn't count - she knew well enough to know it was something else going on inside his head.

Her reflexes were still fast enough though that when the guy at the edge of the counter tried to cop a feel as she went by, he ended up with his wrist twisted and pinned to the bar top instead. The guy was an unfamiliar face and obviously didn't know what he had gotten into. She made eye contact with the man, which broke her eye contact with Cloud, and gave a mild shake of her head.

"No."

Tifa gave her patrons a two-chance rule.

Cloud gave them one and as Tifa came over to him to ask what had been on his mind, he was already pushed back from his chair and standing.

"Sit," he told her gently and then he was striding past. The new guy saw him coming and fear flickered into his eyes. Cloud knew he had a reputation and most of the time he ignored that fact. The guy's face was twisting and Cloud knew it meant either a sneer or an apology was on its way. He didn't pause to find out which. Instead he simply reached out, spun the bar stool around briskly, caught a solid fistful of the back of the guy's shirt and jacket, and, holding the fabric over his shoulder, strode for the door. It served to bring the man in the clothes with him as well. The sputtering started in as the shock wore off just as Cloud hit the door and he pushed it calmly open and stepped outside. It gave him the room he needed and without much effort, or thought for that matter – he was following a thread of an idea forming in his head – he snapped his arm casually around and released.

Possibly for the first time in his life, the guy flew.

The bar didn't let out onto a busy street and there was a convenient alley just across that street from their front door so the guy didn't impact with anything before coming to a natural skidding stop on the rough asphalt almost a block down at the other end of the alley. Pre-Shinra times, the incident might have met with a police report but in this post-Shinra time things were much simpler and as Cloud turned and went back into the bar without bothering see if the guy got up or stayed down in shock for a while, the other patrons of the bar gave him a nod as he strode past and that was the end of the incident.

Tifa sat at the table he'd vacated with a dry look on her face, slowly twisting his empty water glass around in a circle.

She might fool everyone else with her 'I keep the barbarians civilized' face – and Gaia knew, she was the only civilizing factor in her family most of the time – but Cloud had long ago noticed that she never actually protested when he threw someone out. He was careful not to hurt them. Much. He gave her an unrepentant lopsided grin now instead and she shook her head with a sigh and stopped hiding the smile that had been whispering at the edges of her lips. He went down on his knee on the floor and turned the seat of the chair to face him and raised his face.

"Oh, Cloud," her voice was velvet and wine as she leaned down and wrapped her arms around his shoulders. He stole a kiss and against his lips, she sighed: "What am I going to do with you?"

They'd come a long way since the geostigma. He was ready for them to move further.

"Come with me tomorrow."

She nodded against him, showing her automatic trust, and asked:

"Where?"

"To Wutai. And – " the sudden idea caused him to blink it was so right. "Cosmo Canyon on the way home."

"On your delivery?" she drew back but her arms didn't leave his shoulders and so he was content. She looked at him closely. "But that's a two day trip."

He nodded, well aware of how long it took. She gave him a look that said he was being dense.

"Cloud," there was a smile in her chiding. "What about the bar? And the children?"

"Close the bar," he knew it was money they wouldn't be making but some things were more important. "And we'll ask Elmyra if she can keep the kids a couple days more. If she can't," he shrugged, "we'll force Reeve to."

She laughed at his joke. He knew the kids would want to come too but he also knew, once he explained what he had planned, that they'd gladly stay behind.

Of course he was going to tell the kids. He was learning that that was part of what being a family meant – being all in, all together. They'd keep his secret.

Hopefully it wouldn't have to be a secret for too long anyway.

He watched as the idea of going with him, of traveling again, of adventure and seeing familiar places took a hold in Tifa's mind, setting the light in her eyes growing to match the smile on her lips.

She really was the most beautiful woman in the world.

"Yes," she nodded, more enthusiastically. "All right. I'll talk to Elmyra." He got another encompassing hug and, since someone else had tried to touch her earlier, he took advantage of it and pulled her down into his lap. She went with a soft hiccupping sound that could have been a protest but might have been a giggle and she didn't try to slip away, instead tucking her legs against either side of his while he kissed her.

They'd come a long way. Just a few steps more…

Eventually she did have to slide out of his lap and go back to work. His smirk was a bit smug at the pink in her cheeks and the extra bounce in her steps as she did so however and he didn't miss the 'lucky guy' glances shot his way either. He knew he was. Despite all the bad, he was one lucky guy. He straightened up and calmly collected his work for the day. Then he walked behind the counter to return his glass.

"I'll call Elmyra," he told her, surprising her, but he needed to talk to the kids too and it was a good excuse. Then he was going to have to go out for a little while. He always did before his Wutai trips, collecting last minute supplies.

Cloud knew how things were supposed to be done. They'd never been good at doing things in order though. He'd give Tifa anything she wanted. But, in the end, he thought they probably just both wanted the same thing.

His supplies to Wutai would include a wedding band this time around.


	25. Author's Note II

…_this is an author's note…..it is only an author's note….since this is a real note these lines will be followed by important story information….I repeat….this is only an author's note…._

That's right – author's note number 2!

I know lately my story turn out has been pretty slow and most of you know why. Let me just say, not being able to sit down interferes with a lot more of life than would seem apparent at first. I'm on the road of recovery though so it's good news. The really good news though is that, while I was down and out, our beloved Sekihara Tae offered to write me a 'get well' fic. Which I, of course, shamelessly took advantage of because when someone offers you something that priceless you just don't turn it down.

So, if you will all, who haven't already, head over to her place you'll find **Dichroic**, her awesome answer to my prompt. I asked her to write Cloud's POV from one of my game-time fics and she chose 'Fake'. And – wow – what a get-well gift indeed. You won't be disappointed. Please leave her lots of reviews when you visit her too – because everybody knows those make author's eyes all big and sparkly.

…_we now return you to your regularly scheduled reading…thank you…_


	26. Chapter 26: That Man

_I've got just a couple more days before I head up to Dragoncon so just about everything is on hold. But before I went I had to do this. It's a feel better fic for Sekihara Tae who was busy typing mine while she was going through some rough stuff herself. She wanted the next installment of the 'Seduction' and 'Fighter' chapters. Well, here it is even if it didn't turn out the way I'd planned. Cloud's been particularly determined of late. Thanks to demonegg for the idea on his... attire. Set shortly after ACC._

**That Man**

by TamLin

The man was cheating.

Tifa stood in the kitchen in front of the hamper of laundry she had been in the process of carrying into the small side garage to wash and glared accusingly at one of his shirts. He was cheating. Cloud Strife was cheating!

It was bad enough that he'd been around lately. Not 'around' but – around! Cloud's job took him out and about a great deal. Tifa was used to it. Cloud seemed to need to roam just as strongly as he needed to come back home. After the geostigma though he had been making it a point, whenever he could, to be home by dinnertime. It let him eat with the children, it let them have time to spend with him before they had to go to bed, it let him sit at the bar afterward and unwind, going over the messages she'd taken for him and the routes he'd plotted out with the children earlier in the night. It let them spend time together after she'd shut down the bar at one in the morning. He'd help her clean up and then they'd relax together with a movie or talk or more often, simply not talk, snuggled up on the couch. She liked that Cloud was making it a point to come home to them… to her now.

Realizing she was starting to smile at the shirt, she narrowed her eyes and focused on the immediate.

For the past month, Cloud Strife had been seducing her. Not in a way anyone else would recognize but to her it was as obvious as the sword he carried on his back. Yuffie, for instance, was absolutely convinced they were both obtuse about each other – which probably wasn't helped by the fact that whenever she showed up both Cloud and Tifa intentionally acted as dense as two brick walls. It had been particularly hard to keep a straight face the last time though. Yuffie had brought in a magazine with a 'How Do You Know If He's the One' quiz and insisted that Tifa take it with her. Cloud, plotting new routes and sitting at a nearby table in the closed bar, had been behind the tiny ninja's back and out of sight – and, of course, made the briefest, 'Cloud Strife' grimaces with his face over each of the questions. Which had been, to Tifa, as loud and easy to understand as if he'd actually been making the snarky comments out loud. She'd had a hard time pretending she was serious while she answered the quiz with the most clueless answers she could think of. Clueless answers, she was proud to say, that had made Cloud choke on his drink at least once. Yuffie had left disgusted with both of them when, at the end of the quiz, Tifa had managed to give her a friendly, vacuous look at her prompting and Cloud had acted as if he hadn't even been aware of the quiz taking place at all. Later that night, curled up together, he'd kept making her laugh as he quoted ridiculously extravagant quiz questions in monotone and then prodding her with his impression of Yuffie's "like… you know… a certain s_ooooomeone_…"

So the man was seducing her and… and doing it really well, she had to admit. She realized she was holding his crumpled up shirt over her heart and snapped back to what she was supposed to be doing. Which was the laundry.

And plotting revenge. Or at least some kind of viable defense.

Of course, she wasn't entirely faultless. She had decided two could play at the seduction game and she'd done her fair share of teasing in retaliation. She was particularly proud of the way she'd shifted from the bathroom to sitting on the bed when she smoothed the lotion on her legs just before going to bed each night. He seemed to always make it a point to be present for that.

The problem was he was cheating.

She gave his shirt a little shake. It was hard to tell if she was imagining it was a mini-Cloud or if it was the kind of gesture you'd do with a dishrag at a misbehaving dog.

It was bad enough his hands were staring to _drag _when he touched her. He was still using the innocent touches that pretended they didn't mean anything but now when his hand would 'accidentally' brush her stomach on the way by or 'helpfully' push the hair back off her neck or 'incidentally' rest on her hip when they were standing near each other, it would… _drag _when it moved off of her. The touching was bad – wonderful – bad enough, she told herself with a shake of her head as she forcefully shoved his shirt back into the laundry basket with the other clothes. It did all the bone melting, stomach gasping, heart knotting feelings to her but when his fingers and palm _dragged_, slow and warm and solid, against her as his hand slipped away…

There were rules, gosh darn it! And she couldn't play by them if he was busy making her want to either bite him or tackle him to the floor.

That man was cheating!

It wasn't just the… dragging either. He'd taken to nuzzling. Cloud Strife was a nuzzler! It was… horribly devastating because half of the time it wasn't even meant as anything other than sweet and innocent. The other half of the time of course, standing behind her while she tried to talk on the phone, or cook dinner, or get something out of the storage closet – well, the other half of the time it was the exhale of his breath like liquid fire against her skin and weak knees and roller coaster stomach. But the times he did it innocently… oh, he melted her heart and soul in the unconscious moments when he rubbed his cheek or his chin against her, usually when he was half asleep and not aware, seeking or sharing or giving comfort and reassurance. There was something amazingly defenseless and intimate about his unconscious nuzzles.

She smoothed a hand over his shirt with a soft smile, eyes distant.

The tinny sound of dropped metal, small enough to indicate a tool of some kind, came through the door to the garage and brought her back to reality. Cloud was taking a day off to work on Fenrir. He insisted the machine needed a tune-up even though she suspected it was just an excuse to play with his favorite toy. One of his favorite toys, she amended with a smirk and shifted the hamper to her hip.

The garage was going to be hot. Despite the weather outside, the small, windowless room held heat from the boiler and now it would hold the heat from the dryer too. Cloud had the same resistance to heat that he did to cold though. Maybe she'd sit in there with him though since the kids were gone with Barret for the afternoon. It was normal for them to keep each other company even if it was without a single word of conversation and doing entirely different things. It was just… better when they could be in the same room.

She pushed the door between the rooms open with her free hip and let herself in. Usually when he was in the garage the family respected his private space and left Cloud alone. He'd wander out when he wanted their company. But today was laundry day. Today was always laundry day and Cloud knew it. In fact, he'd asked earlier before declaring he was going to be working in there on Fenrir so she didn't feel bad about intruding.

With a soft noise, she dropped the hamper on the floor in front of the washer and then turned, hands on her hips and relaxed, to make a comment.

Whatever she'd meant to say flew right out her ear as her mind went blank.

Cloud Strife, flat on his back, had pushed himself out from under Fenrir and now proceed to lever himself up on his elbows. Tifa's eyes blinked but that was the extent of her reaction.

Cloud Strife, live in 'he's the one' and partner in crime as well as child raising, was looking at her with a raised pale brow and…

"Where's your shirt?" She was proud of how calm and steady her voice came out. One of his shoulders shifted and his lips relaxed. She noted the smear of grease across his side where he'd absently rubbed a hand… and the way the muscles in his side there overlapped and melted so smoothly into his flat stomach.

"It's hot," was his perfectly logical, perfectly mild answer.

"yeah…" she agreed weakly. The edge of his mouth hooked upward into one of those smirks she remembered so well and it snapped her back to herself. In one smooth move she stooped down, scooped up his shirt and threw it at him in a ball.

"Cloud Stife, you're doing that on purpose," she accused watched the other edge of his lips twitch upward as well. He caught the shirt on reflex and used it to wipe his face. A single bead of sweat escaped the collection and slid down the long column of his throat.

"What?" he asked calmly. "Trying not to overheat?"

"Yes! No – you – "

The pale brow jerked again and the blue eyes were laughing. Part of the game they were playing though was that you weren't allowed to call the other person on it when they were flirting with you. You were supposed to act unaware. She shot him a narrow look and he just innocently tilted his head to the side.

She thought he had the nicest throat and it melted down into the smoothest, strongest set of shoulders…

With a stifled noise in her throat she spun around and started to load the washing machine.

"You're a terrible man," she told him and he hummed his agreement, sounding pleased and amused. She concentrated on the clothes, separating lights and darks and checking both the children's and Cloud's pants pockets before committing them to the wash. She was not going to drool. She was not. He was cheating again and she was not going to give in first.

That… that – man!

That… very handsome, stunning, well built, shirtless and sweaty man who was only a few feet away from her…

An muscled arm reached past her and she jumped, swallowing down a hiccuping noise. So intent on ignoring him that he'd come up right behind her and she'd missed it. His throaty chuckle near her shoulder was devastating.

"What are you doing?" she didn't dare turn around, she was already far too aware of exactly what – and who – and in what state – was standing directly behind her.

"Returning my shirt," he answered helpfully as he set it in the pile of whites she'd had on the top of the dryer as part of her sorting. She could smell him, that pleasant smell of sweat and Fenrir and lightening wind and male.

"That's dark…" she managed and he made a humming noise as if he was actually interested. She swallowed against a dry throat. He was so close she could feel the heat of him but somehow, maddeningly, he wasn't actually touching her. She cleared her throat and tried again. "The shirt. It goes in the dark pile."

He made another humming noise to show he was listening and taking her words to heart and she thought she felt the puffed exhale of his breath against her throat, tickling through the hair she'd pulled back in a ponytail for work. His other hand found the dryer on the other side of her and braced there, strong, long fingered hands sporting nicks and oil stains.

"We should probably put it there," he offered, voice dark honey, shifting as if he was moving his face – his nose, she knew he was inhaling the scent of her hair because he did it when he thought she wasn't paying attention sometimes.

"Mm," she agreed helplessly, her own hands shifting to brace against the dryer as well but it was for support. Oh, Gaia… the man was being feral…

"Teef," his gravel voice was amused. "It's in the white pile. My hands are covered in grease."

She made a little sound in her throat that had been intended to indicate understanding and instead came out a little like a squeak. In response to the noise, his arms on either side of her shifted inward and she felt the press of his body against hers. Nice, good smelling, hot, hard, male Cloud body –

His hands found their way to the skin of her stomach where the shirt she was wearing left it exposed and _dragged_ as they wrapped around her. She felt him bury his face in her hair and realized, in shock, that his breathing wasn't steady.

"Cloud…" his name came out soft and wrapping in the things he did to her and she heard him exhale a pleased sound against her. His fingers, slick with oil, rubbed gentle circles over her bare skin and then tightened, indicating need and restraint. His voice was quiet as he said:

"Not until you ask."

The only reason she was still standing, and not a puddle of jelly on the floor, was the fact that he had her pinned between himself and the washing machine. She forgot why she was supposed to be ignoring him.

"Cloud?"

Again the amusement sounded in his throat even if it didn't make it past his lips. Lips that he lowered to rub against her bare shoulder.

"Tifa…" the way he said her name held absolute adoration and a surprising tinge of gentle frustration. His arms went around her completely and pulled her entirely back into the curve of his body. "Hasn't it ever occurred to you that I'm waiting – for you?"

"Me?" it came out weakly, repeating from habit the last word said whenever her mind needed time to catch up to what was going on. His chin found her shoulder and he rested the side of his face against hers, closing his eyes. For some reason it was just as devastating as his hands earlier had been on her skin except this time…

this time it was her aching heart that was threatened.

"You," he agreed easily. "Since I was about six."

She tilted her chin, just a little, and looked at him from the sides of her eyes.

"For?" she prompted softly and his lips smiled, just a little. He opened his eyes.

"For you to notice me. And then for you to love me." His lips twitched. "Then for you to realize you loved me." He exhaled. "And then for you to realize I loved you."

They weren't talkers, either of them. They were much better at showing each other what they felt than explaining it. But his brows were a little down and his eyes were dark. He'd apparently given this a great deal of thought. Reaching up she rested her arms over his, hugging him to her. She turned her face to nudge him gently with her nose, burying his revelations deep in her heart where she knew she would listen to them over and over and over again. He'd said though…

"What are we waiting for now?" she asked him softly. He made a low sound in his throat in answer and his hands shifted to find hers, fingers intertwining.

"For you to realize I've always loved you and it never changed." His blue eyes lifted and found hers and they were the color of the mountain sky on a clear morning. One edge of his mouth lifted. "And for you to ask me to kiss you."

Her heart stumbled over the first but what popped out of her mouth was the second.

"I have to ask?"

"Mm," his brows were down as he nodded seriously, even if his eyes were amused. His fingers moved against her skin, making hers do so as well since they were twined so tightly with his. Throaty voice an exhale against her cheek, he thoughtfully added: "Soon would be good too."

"Cloud – " she protested it. It was one thing entirely to play and flirt and tease… and even, in a safe way, seduce. It was another entirely to just come out and state what she wanted. She wasn't – she'd never been able to do that. And somehow, she realized he knew that too. Wrapped safe in the warmth of his arms it was easier to face… but actually doing so was entirely different.

"Not until you ask," he murmured against her shoulder as he lowered his head. The bare skin there got a soft kiss despite his words but then he straightened and let go of her, keeping one of her hands in his.

"Come on," he tugged her hand, "help me with Fenrir."

He was giving her space without leaving her. Letting her adjust and absorb without crowding her for an answer. He was being sweet and patient with her.

He was being gentle.

She refused to move and it pulled him to a stop since she refused to let go of his hand too. He paused and looked back at her with his breathtaking body and the soul hiding inside it that was even more breathtaking to her. Both parts of him were scarred. But it was okay. She was scarred too. His eyes were accepting but not expectant.

"Could you – " it caught in her throat and she looked down. Struggling. Soft, his voice found her.

"Do you trust me?"

"Yes!" her eyes jumped to his, hurt he would even ask. And yet… there was something about the question…

"Then ask me."

Did she trust him? Really trust him? With more than the simple things, with the complicated things too? With… her? After all these years, after all they'd been through, after all they'd both done to each other… did she trust him?

"Kiss me?"

It came out weak and helpless and lost, but her eyes found his and there was hope there too. Something in his own eyes seemed to relax as well and it was something that never had before. He stepped back to her.

"Yes," he exhaled against her lips. She had a second to shiver at the way that felt… and at what she'd just stepped forward into, and then his mouth was slipping over hers.

It was soft and sweet and lingering. Something inside her sighed out and she swayed forward into him with a quiet sound. A low hum answered in his throat and his arms came around her, tucking her protectively in against his chest, in the shelter of his arms. As if they had all the time in the world, his lips nuzzled against hers, slowly luring her deeper. She was surrounded by the scent of him, the heat of him, the solid strength of him. She was surprised to find that, as the hot oil started to settle into her bones and joints, a strange sense of peace settled into her heart at the same time that felt the same way. His lips shifted and she followed, feeling him smile without breaking the kiss as the move sealed them closer together. When he finally drew back, just enough so that their noses bushed each others, she was warm and liquid and wonderful and she didn't open her eyes.

"Again?" she asked in a whisper and heard his chuckle before his lips found hers again.


	27. Chapter 27: The Cliché Closet Conundrum

_okay, back from Dragoncon and trying to catch up before I disappear again next week. In the meantime however I just had to get this 'get well' fic out for demonegg, who, among other things had an attempt on her life by her mother's evil hot dog dog. I haven't fogotten my other prompts, so don't fear. I just wanted to get this one out in semi-time to be applicable. set during the Nibelheim incident in CC._

**The Cliché Closet Conundrum**

by TamLin

Zack was bored.

It was a rough thing on him, being bored. He liked to think he was a man of action, always on the look out for heroic deeds, work to be done, or… well, mischief was pretty good too. The point was – he was a man of action. And kicking around this backwater town was _killing_ him…

Not that Nibelheim wasn't nice. It was. It was rustic and wild and small and mellow. He liked exploring the mountains; Cloud was a kick ass guide. So was Tifa. Both of them knew all kinds of cool and obscure places hidden in the mountains. But Cloud was sulking in the hotel room and Tifa was out training.

Things were a lot less fun without Cloud.

Zack swung his arms wide and dropped to do a couple of squats.

Sephiroth was _still _holed up in that dusty old house. He couldn't seriously be intending to read _all_ those books. Could he?

Zack was afraid he could, and that he would, which meant even more boredom and sitting still. Shouldn't they be doing something about those weird monsters in the reactor? Or Genesis? Sephiroth must have sent in a report, the guy was a stickler. Were they waiting for reinforcements, the Turks, or new orders? Zack didn't know. He wasn't the commanding officer and Sephiroth just kept saying 'let me be alone'. He was tempted to call ShinRa himself but that felt a little like insubordination, going behind the General's back like that. The army was a 'need to know' kind of place, and Zack wasn't sure that he needed to know so much as wanted to. That, and more importantly, he didn't know if he'd be willing to trust whatever they told him if he did get through to talk to somebody. At this point, he trusted the General more than he trusted the company.

He finished his exercise and straightened but it hadn't burned off much of his excess energy.

This town didn't even have a pool hall! Not even a pinball machine!

Running his hands through his hair he thought maybe he'd go get Spiky. There was that mountain lake that looked like it was an entire other world instead of a reflection of the one above it that Tifa had shown him the last time they'd gone kicking around. He'd get Cloud and they could go swimming! It would be freezing but that's what mountain lakes were supposed to be for, right? From what he understood, alcohol was usually a factor in mountain lake skinny-dipping but Zack didn't need alcohol to have fun. He smacked his fist into his palm and turned for the inn.

And then stopped.

Right. Spike. He was still moping over not being a SOLDIER. No… Zack was a little bit more observant than that. Cloud was moping about not being a SOLDIER for _Tifa_.

He'd known the guy was hung up on some girl. There were too many signs even though he never said anything and once Zack had fallen head over heels for his own girl –

Aerith.

Man, he wondered how she was doing. He wanted to call her but he'd already called her that morning. He didn't have anything new to talk about. He hated being on the phone and suddenly running out of things to say. Usually it wasn't a problem but seriously –

Nothing was going on!

What had he been thinking about? Oh, Cloud. Yeah. Spike had it bad. It was kind of funny because Zack had always assumed any girl Cloud fell for would be the brainy type. All quiet with glasses and mousy hair. Instead it turned out Cloud had it for the town hottie! Except… Tifa didn't act like the town hottie or at least not like any town hottie Zack had ever met. She was really – normal. Nice and thoughtful and helpful and funny and tough. Zack got why Cloud was so hung up on her and he didn't think it was the long legs or the impressive chest. She was nice.

He bet Aerith would have liked her.

Not that he was stupid enough to tell his girl about Tifa. Not while he was still in the same village with that girl and his own girl was an ocean away. Zack knew he might not be the genius Seph was but he sure as fire wasn't stupid. He rubbed the back of his head. He'd tell Aerith about Tifa when they were together again and he'd do it because he'd be talking about Cloud and his thing for her.

Cloud and his thing for the village guide… Tifa would be good for him. She was shy too in the weirdest way but she'd be good for Cloud. She sure seemed interested in finding out about someone that sounded a lot like Cloud… and about how the soldier that had saved her was doing… It made Zack grin. Maybe she had a thing for his friend too! That would be cool. Cloud was a cool guy. They could get together and then he and Aerith could get together and they could all go out together! Then Zack exhaled and frowned. Except Cloud was never going to make a move on Tifa at this rate and even if Seph _did_ read _all_ those books they'd still be leaving pretty soon. Still frowning, Zack crossed his arms over his chest and tucked his chin.

Obviously someone had to do something…

The thought made him grin and then frown again.

Obviously, as Cloud's best bud and friend, it was Zack's job to be that someone. But what could he do? Instinctively he knew that just telling Spike to get his ass in gear wasn't going to motivate. Cloud could be stubborn sometimes. Okay, all the time. Zack thought he was a pretty brave guy. After all, Spike had been with Tseng in the clone camp and he'd showed up to try to help with Hollander and he'd taken on those monsters on the mountain and then a summon AND Genesis clones at the reactor. The guy was quiet about it but Zack knew he wasn't a coward. Somehow, he didn't think that hitting on Tifa was within Spike's courage level though. Not even if Zack told him it was a pretty good chance she'd go for it.

That meant he had to be sneaky about this. Kind of like… an covert mission. Yeah! Subtle…

Zack rubbed his chin and settled into his 'contemplating' pose. Almost immediately he snapped his fingers but then he frowned again. No, he couldn't call Aerith and get the woman's viewpoint on this. He'd already decided it was safer to save talking about another girl, even another guy's girl, until he could do it to her face and watch her eyes to see if he was getting into trouble or not. And he certainly wasn't going to ask the General.

Though the thought was kind of funny…

'Focus, Zack! This is your best buddy's future happiness at stake! If you don't make sure he gets his girl, he's going to end up like… like Tseng. Think, man, think! You can't let that happen to Spiky.'

Several townspeople, going about their daily routines, spared slightly worried looks for the form of the SOLDIER 1st Class standing with his hand frozen on his chin near the well. Mr. Green, the local grocer, commented he'd been that way without moving for almost an hour. He wasn't the only one that jumped reflexively when the young man sudden jumped himself, snapping his finger and rushed off to the inn with a yell. The grin on his face, it was commented, looked a bit… maniacal.

But everyone knew SOLDIERs weren't the most stable anyway.

~*~*~

"Zack?" Cloud sounded slightly suspicious and the look in his eyes mirrored the tone.

"What?"

"You're not on sugar pills by accident again, are you?"

"No," the dark haired man was quick to defend. "That was a one time thing. Placebos or whatever. I was supposed to think they were mood-relaxers. The doc just forgot they were made mostly of sugar."

Cloud's hum was noncommittal but he stepped away from the window he'd been looking out and picked up his helmet. Spike wouldn't even go outside his room without it on.

"You sure we need to go up to the reactor again?" Cloud asked as he pulled it on. "I'm kind of worried about leaving the General alone. He's… acting kind of weird."

That did make Zack pause. Cloud has a weird way of reading people. He thought maybe it was because Spike was scary observant. If he said Sephiroth was acting weird, than Sephiroth was acting weird. Or… weirder than he usually did at least. Zack rubbed the back of his head and thought about it but decided they'd be okay. He'd already checked in on Seph and the guy was only about halfway down the hall of bookshelves and still doing his 'let me be alone' bit. Besides – they weren't really going to the reactor. That was just his excuse.

"It'll be okay," he assured his friend. "We won't be gone that long."

"Okay," the blond tightened the strap that held his helmet on and then slung his rifle over his shoulder. Spiky was a pretty good shot but both he and Zack thought he'd look better with a sword instead.

Maybe if Zack's plan worked, he'd figure out a way to make that happen too. A good woman could be some kind of motivation and Zack had already meant to bring up Cloud's SOLDIER test to Seph once this thing was over and the General had been able to see just how awesome Spike really was. Cloud was stubborn enough, he could make SOLDIER 1st, and who knew what else, if they'd only give him a chance.

"Cool!" Zack clapped his friend on the shoulder and then went out the door and down the stairs two at a time. Cloud took them slower and the nearer he got to the bottom the more his steps slowed. Zack ignored it.

"Now we gotta go pick up Tifa and then we're good to go!"

"Tifa's coming?" Cloud asked and there was such a mix of emotions in his quiet voice that it made Zack's chest hurt in sympathy. Yeah. He really had to get those two together. His friend deserved to get a girl that made him sound like that.

"Sure!" he kept his voice cheerful though, Spike wouldn't appreciate knowing he was so transparent. He couldn't help adding: "Though you two are going to have to hang out together for a while without me once we get there. ShinRa secrets and all."

Behind him, he heard Cloud's steps trip over themselves for a second before righting and he grinned as he led the way to Tifa's house. He really should have figured it out about the two of them earlier. The girl next door… how obvious was that?

Confident, he knocked on the door. He'd seen her coming back about ten minutes ago so he figured she'd be ready to go. Suddenly it occurred to him that her dad might be home. If her dad was around it would ruin his plan! So when the door swung open to reveal a puzzled looking Tifa the first thing he blurted was:

"Is your dad home?"

"Um," she gave him a puzzled look. "No?"

"Oh good," he exhaled his relief and only realized how that probably sounded after she gave him another slightly odd look. He grinned.

"You look really nice," he complimented and, as he'd figured it would, it immediately sidetracked her as she blushed and stepped back, looking awkward. Zack ignored Cloud's growl behind him and stepped in through the now undefended door. Making room for Cloud as well, he put his hands on his hips and scanned the room. He was looking for something specific….

Ah! There it was!

To cover his surveillance of the room, he gave her another grin.

"Your house looks really nice too."

Standing to the side of the door, the look she gave him was vaguely confused and helpless.

"Thanks?"

"No problem. Saaaaay – you up to taking us up the mountain today?"

She brightened immediately at that, and, Zack thought, she stole a glance at the soldier standing behind him.

"Sure!" Then she faltered and reached up to touch her hair. It was damp, probably from a shower she'd taken after her training session, and she was wearing a tattered pair of short shorts and a half shirt. Zack thought it made her look softer and more approachable. Which was good 'cause Spike was going to be doing some approaching in a minute.

Even if the poor sap didn't know it yet.

"I'll go change," she said as she spun for the stairs and Zack jerked forward:

"No! I mean… not yet?" he hazarded as she turned around to give him a funny look. He rubbed the back of his head and realized he was in trouble. He's been planning on improvising a great deal of his clever plan and now things were starting to get harder than he'd thought they'd be. "Hey – what's that?"

His attempted distraction had her giving the door he was pointing at a wary look.

"The closet…" she drawled slowly, eyeing him from the corners of her eyes as if wondering at his sanity.

"Can I see?"

"Um," she actually looked past him at the soldier still in the doorway as if asking what was going on. Zack didn't get Cloud's response but it was – hopefully – just a shrug and not the finger rotating by the ear that indicated 'crazy'. Spike liked him too much to do that to him. Again.

Whatever response she got, she moved over to the closet with an "oh… kay" and opened the door.

Yep. It was a closet.

Full of coats with some boots and an umbrella and a couple boxes on the top shelf.

Zack improvised.

"You think we'll need the umbrella?"

Tifa reached up and scratched her head but he suspected it was more at him than the question.

"Not really."

"I really like those boots. Spike, get over here and look at these boots." When Cloud didn't, Zack reached over with a long arm and hauled him over.

"They're mud boots," Tifa's puzzlement wasn't dissipating. "You know… to put on over your shoes during rainy season…"

"Can I see them?"

She gave him a blank look. And than that every so predictable and wonderfully manipulatable Nibelheim helpfulness kicked in despite herself and she nodded and leaned down to get them.

"Better grab the umbrella, Spiky," Zack added cheerfully and, as if catching the evil gleam in mako eyes, Cloud suddenly started to back away. Which wasn't going to do at all. SOLDIER reflexes kicked in the extra speed he needed and he grabbed Spike by the arm with one hand while he gave Tifa a shove with the other. She went into the closet with a muffled noise that didn't sound particularly ladylike – Cloud went into the closet with what sounded, internally to Zack, like a silent scream, and Zack –

…well, Zack tripped when he was using his momentum to toss Cloud in the closet and fell in too. The door shut with a defining thud.

For a second it was completely dark and completely silent.

Then he got an elbow in the ribs. A _hard _elbow in the ribs.

"Open the damn door," Cloud's hiss sounded suspiciously like a growl and from the other side of Spike Tifa made a hiccupping sound. Zack blinked a few times and, thanks to his mako enhanced vision, saw why.

She was in Spiky's arms.

Well, kinda. Cloud had apparently caught her when they'd both tumbled and while he had one hand braced against the wall in an attempt to kept their tangled legs from toppling them over, his other arm was most definitely around the brunette's bare waist and, if Zack did say so himself, seemed to be holding her a lot closer against himself than was absolutely necessary. What really made Zack grin though was the fact that both of her arms were around Cloud's shoulders and her fingers were digging into the fabric of his uniform shirt. Sure, it was for balance but the point was – they were hugging!

Yes! Plan Zack was a success!

The second he let them out of here however, he was pretty sure they'd jump apart like they were on fire. That wasn't going to do at all. Reaching out he wrapped his hand around the doorknob and –

"Oops," the sound of metal breaking was audible. "Guess I don't know my own strength."

Then he shifted, trying to duck down a little because the bar everything was hung on kept whacking him.

"Zaaack," Cloud's voice was so low it would have been hard to hear the name past the rumbling growl if it wasn't for the way his friend enunciated each letter so thoroughly.

He should really tell the blond not to growl because it tended to scare women… except he noticed that their guide's long fingers were moving and tightening just a little bit on his friend's shirt. Score, Spiky!

"Looks like we're stuck," Zack informed the two 'soon to be, Zack instigated' lovers. He could actually hear Cloud's exhale. He hoped his friend was appreciating the way a woman fresh out of the shower smelled. He could pick it up from here and it was a nice smell. Something warm and soft and refreshing.

Aerith usually smelled like flowers. He shut his eyes briefly. Flowers and the way a morning smelled when you were out in the field and everything was nice and fresh and brand new…

"-break the door."

Cloud's threatening voice snapped him back to the present and he opened his eyes.

"What?"

"I said," Cloud was still talking in a hiss and Zack finally realized it was so that the woman in his arms wouldn't recognize his voice. "Why don't you break the door down?"

It was a sign, as far as Zack was concerned, on the tension brewing between the two in the closet with him when Tifa didn't protest the destruction of a part of her house.

He also didn't hear her agree.

He narrowed his eyes and shifted. Since he could see, and they couldn't, he leaned a little. It pushed Cloud forward. Which pushed him into Tifa more. She made another soft sound and Zack didn't think it was the protesting kind.

"Zack," the way Cloud said the name indicated a long, bloody and painful death in his sleep tonight for the SOLDIER. But he also planted his feet and hitched Tifa up a little bit. Zack snuck a glance down and saw she was on her toes, bare legs tangled up with Cloud's.

Putting the moves on the girl in the dark… oh yeah. Zack had known this was a genius idea.

"Can't." He gave a verbal shrug with his voice. "That's destroying private property. ShinRa regs say company employees are supposed to respect civilian property unless otherwise instructed."

Cloud was just in the process of hissing something that sounded particularly vile and had Zack wondering in awe where he'd learned a word like that when the sound of the front door slamming shut was distinctly heard through the wood of the closet. All of them froze.

"Tifa?"

Zack recognized the voice of Mr. Lockhart and his heart dropped a little. This had been going so well too. Before he could even decide that he wasn't going to be the one to call out and give them away though, he felt Tifa's hand scrambling against his shoulder.

"Don't!" She whispered it so soft, his mako hearing was all that picked it up but the absolute panic and desperation in it was obvious. He looked at her in surprise to see that she'd somehow managed to get her hand past Cloud's scarf and over his mouth and that her eyes were wide in the pitch black and she was shaking her head even though Zack was the only one that could see it. "Please, don't!"

"Tifa?" her father's voice called it again, louder this time, and all three of the conspirators in the closet held their breath.

"That kid," Mr. Lockhart's voice was more level when he heard no answer. "Leaving the front door open. And when we've got ShinRa in town too."

Heavy steps retreated to another part of the house and Zack actually heard Tifa's exhale of relief. He looked to see she'd dropped her head onto Spiky's shoulder but still had her hand over his mouth.

His friend SO owed him big time for this!

They all jerked stiff again when the sound of boot steps came back. It seemed to take forever for them to cross the hall and reach the front door. Which opened and then closed again. Everyone waited but there was no sound of steps back into the house. Tifa made a noise of relief this time when she sagged back into Cloud. Not that Zack minded if it bought his friend some extra snuggle time but –

"Uh… Teef?"

"Can you imagine what my dad would think if he found me in the closet with a guy? With _two _guys?" her voice held the edge of horror. "He already thinks I'm too wild because I do martial arts instead of quilting. He'd freak if he found me this way!"

Zack chuckled.

"Daddy's little girl?" he teased in amusement and she lifted her chin from Cloud's shoulder to stick her tongue out at him in the dark. Cloud however muttered:

"You're not that kind of girl," sounding almost angry and definitely defensive.

Awwww, Spiky was feeling protective over his girl's reputation. Aerith was so going to smother him with 'aren't you adorable' hugs when she heard this story….

"Of course not," Tifa mumbled, letting go of Zack's shoulder and, to Zack's horror, starting to untangle herself from Cloud. To his credit, Spiky wasn't helping - but he wasn't hindering either.

"Woops!" Zack jostled them both, almost knocking them over and definitely into the coats. Cloud grunted – and caught Tifa close to keep her upright. Tifa however, let out a surprised:

"Ow!"

"Teef?" Zack was suddenly worried but he saw her wave the hand that had found it's way back to Cloud's shoulder again.

"No. It's okay."

"It was my helmet," Cloud's low mutter sounded guilty and ashamed. Zack was opening his mouth to say it when Tifa's quiet, almost shy voice beat him to it.

"Why don't you take it off?"

For a second, everyone in the closet forgot to breathe again.

'Come on, Spiky', Zack silently urged, knowing enough to keep his mouth shut. 'Do it for your girl.'

Cloud didn't move and Zack was getting ready to reach up and pop him on the back of his metal clad head when, again, Tifa beat him to the punch. Very slowly her fingers worked their way from where they'd settled on his shoulder around to where the strap that held the helmet in place was. She was doing it in the dark, without sight for her, and Zack could only imagine what the feel of those barely there, searching fingers on him were doing to Spike.

He also noticed she knew where to search for the strap… which meant she'd been paying attention sometime before.

The strap came loose and even Zack could feel the way Cloud swallowed. Carefully searching again, Tifa's fingers found the top of the helmet and wrapped around it as they pushed it back. The metal dropped to land with a muffled sound on the boots on the floor. Zack forgot to breathe as Tifa's hand returned and, very lightly, ruffled the hair at the back of Cloud's exposed neck.

"See?" she whispered and Zack swore she'd forgotten there was anyone in the closet but her and the man holding her. "Isn't that better?"

Cloud made a soft sound and nodded, even though she'd feel it but not see it in the dark. Zack knew he'd been utterly forgotten and, even though his neck was starting to get stiff from ducking the damn coat bar, he made sure he didn't move and remind them. Tifa made a soft sound of her own, though hers was throatier, and settled her cheek against Cloud's shoulder again, arms winding around him.

"So, it's okay… right?" she asked hesitantly and again, Cloud nodded, his cheek brushing against her hair. She made a pleased sound. And then, almost surprised into cheering, Zack watched as Cloud very carefully turned them both around, sheltering the back of her head with a hand as he shifted to rest his back and shoulders against the wall and the piled coats, other arm holding her against him so that she rested in the slight incline of his body. In the dark, his eyes were only on her, despite the fact he couldn't see a thing. Zack felt almost awkward at the look on his friend's face as he 'looked' down at the woman he'd always adored nestled trustingly in the cradle of his body.

Zack was surprised to find that it didn't remind him of him and Aerith. Not that it was better or worse. It was just… different. Zack thought that was probably okay. He liked what he had with Aerith. He more than liked it. Cloud deserved his own thing when it came to the woman he was in love with.

Zack was still going to see if he could get a double date out of this when it was over.

Cloud's hand stroked gently over Tifa's hair as he held her. She seemed perfectly content to stay that way.

If he'd had more room, Zack would have attempted to pat himself on the back for an awesome job. He was the best friend in the whole world! Content with himself, he tried to cross his arms over his chest and accidentally whacked on of them on the wall. Cloud's blue eyes flickered up in the dark.

"I don't suppose you remembered to bring your PHS so we can call somebody to come get us?" he asked in a whisper. For some reason they were all whispering. It just seemed suitable for the situation. Zack's face suddenly fell as he realized he did have his PHS on him. He always had his PHS on him and Cloud knew it. Spike, who couldn't see him, was still doing a pretty good job of looking at him levelly. Zack was about to admit defeat when he realized… Cloud was _looking_ at him. Not literally but there was definitely a look in those blue eyes. Zack's jaw dropped open and he actually put a hand to his mouth in shock at what those eyes were saying over the top of Tifa's dark hair. Then he started to grin. Way too cheerfully, he answered:

"Nope. Totally left it in the room."

Cloud made a noise that was probably supposed to sound disappointed but the look on his face disagreed even though he was doing a good job of repressing it. In his arms, Tifa made a soft sound and surreptitiously snuggled in closer and Zack watched Cloud forget Zack was in the area again as his face softened and went hopeless and fulfilled at the same time.

After that it was just a matter of trying to find a way to stand there comfortably without disturbing the two snuggling in each other's arms across from him. He couldn't put his hands behind his head like he wanted to and he couldn't stand up all the way because the shelf of the closet was too low. He couldn't do squats to burn off the excessive energy. Now he knew why, in all the 'closet' stories he'd read, the friend/friends were always careful not to get locked in with the two romantic leads. There was really nothing to do and it wasn't like he could start up a conversation to entertain himself. He couldn't even call Aerith because he wasn't supposed to have his PHS on him. He tried to scratch the back of his head and banged his elbow again. Both Cloud and Tifa ignored him.

At least they were behaving themselves. Some of the closet stories he'd read got kind of steamy and that would have just been downright awkward.

Zack was just realizing that he was starting to get hungry and he hadn't thought to bring a snack when the sound of a whistle whispered faintly through the door. He recognized it because it blew about an hour before sunset each day. Tifa had told him it was a left over from when the people from Nibelheim had used to actually work at the reactor before it had been shut down years ago. Both Tifa and Cloud stirred at it and Tifa slowly straightened. Just a little, Zack noticed. She certainly wasn't pulling out of Cloud's arms in the least.

"I need to start making dinner. Daddy will worry if I'm not around by the time he gets home."

"I really don't want to break your door," Zack said even though he figured it was about time to get them out of there. She made a little sound that sounded, suspiciously like laughter.

"You could just take the pins out of the hinges and open the door that way." There was definite amusement in her whisper. Zack's eyes popped wide and he stared at her in shock. Cloud had gone a shocked still. In the dark, Zack watched her cheeks flush and she ducked her chin.

"I mean, thinking about it, I just realized, just now, that, you know, something like that would probably work. If we tried it, I mean." She raised eyes in the dark toward where she knew Zack was and, to him, they didn't look repentant. He started to grin.

Oh… Spike SO owed him!

And Tifa was SO cool!

"Yeah," he pretended to give it some thought. "That would probably work. But since I'm the only one that can see in the dark, maybe you and Spike should squeeze over into this corner so I can do that. It's going to be tight," he warned

In the dark, he watched both Tifa and Cloud pressing their mouths tightly closed, fighting, apparently hard, not to grin or laugh. Cloud was the one that ended up making the calm sound of understanding.

It took some doing but soon enough Spiky and his girl were wound tightly together in the opposite corner, with Tifa pressed between Cloud and the wall this time, and Zack was squatting down. The pins in the hinges were easy to take out but he fumbled with them and took his time anyway. He didn't hear any complaints.

He was working the last one sloooowly free when he heard noise behind him and shot a look over his shoulder to see Cloud half leaned over and fumbling around for his dropped helmet.

'Aw, no, Spiky,' he wanted to protest. 'She's already yours, man. No way a girl that snuggles you like that is gonna hold it against you – long – for not telling her who you are. Teef's cooler than that.'

Cloud lifted the helmet clear and straightened though and the look on his face was determined. Tangled up with Tifa the way he was though, she must have realized what he was doing and her hands fluttered in the darkness until fingertips found metal. They tapped experimentally over it and Cloud paused in lifting it. Actually hesitating when Zack had never seen him break off of his chosen course before for anyone or anything when he had that look in his eyes. In the dark, Tifa lifted her face to his and the look in her eyes was stricken and pleading. But Cloud couldn't see it and his own head was bowed and defeated looking.

Those two were going to break his heart, Zack thought, and he was just in the process of shifting over to 'accidentally' nudge them closer together when – again – Tifa was faster.

Light, fingers searching, one of her hands left the helmet and felt their way up Cloud's chest and throat to find his face. Feather light, shy, her palm found his cheek and settled there for a minute. In the dark, Cloud's eyes shut and the breath left him silently. Tifa's lips twisted, sad and wry, but they smiled just a little too. Zack watched determination settle over her face and thought… she looked a lot like Spike when she did that. Tender, she nudged Cloud's chin up and then gave the helmet a nudge with her other hand. Permission?

Absolution?

Cloud's face changed and his shoulders lost the droop they'd acquired when he'd reached for the helmet. Tifa must have felt it because her lips smiled again and it was softer and less hurt this time. When Cloud pulled on his helmet, it was Tifa's slender fingers that searched for and found the strap, buckling it back into place slowly.

Like a woman helping a warrior of old put on his armor before she sent him into battle, Zack thought…

Cloud's hand found her fingers after she'd done so and, shy but sure, he raised them to his lips. Zack, waiting for a kiss, was surprised when he instead gently blew against the tips but it made Tifa's face soften and fill with light at the same time. Zack didn't get it – but he did get that things were okay now.

Weird. But okay.

He popped the last pin free and, sure enough, the door lifted easily free, leaving them all blinking in the setting light coming in the windows of the house.

Tifa walked them to the door and Zack sheepishly handed the broken doorknob to her.

"I'll get you another one."

She shook her head.

"Don't. I – " she hesitated and then, looking down and yet smiling, said: "I kind of like this one."

It made Zack grin and he slung an arm around Spike's shoulders. Who hadn't, the entire time, been able to look away from the mountain guide.

"Cool!" Zack was pleased. He let go of Cloud long enough to stretch and then opened the door.

"So, Teef – " he grinned at her. "You think you can take us up the mountain tomorrow?"

~*~*~

_So – the conversation went a little bit like this:_

_Cloud: "Zack, you're such a moron."_

_Zack: "But it worked, didn't it?"_

_Cloud: "I don't believe I'm going along with this but – the closet?"_

_Zack: "Oh yeah. It always works!"_

long pause…

_Cloud: "oh…?"_

_Zack: "Yep. You've got the two romantic leads with all their unresolved attraction, one of their friends, or a lot of their friends, get tired of it, and lock them in the closet together. The two romantics, not the friends. I kinda… yeah, that wasn't intentional. My neck still has a crick in it."_

longer pause…

_Cloud: "Zack… is this… did you get that idea from… __fanfiction?"_

_Zack (_cheerfully_): "Yeah!"_

_Cloud: "Oh, for the love of – "_hand goes over face_, "Zack – that's a storage closet. Not a coat closet."_

_Zack: "Really? Well that does explain some of the positi-"_

_Cloud: "Hang on… you've been reading fanfiction? Of what? Where?"_

_Zack: "It's pretty cool! You know Sephiroth's 'Silver Elite' and Genesis' 'Red Leather' fan clubs? Well – "_

_Cloud: "It's pink."_

_Zack: "What?"_

_Cloud: "Genesis wears pink. I don't care what anybody says."_

_Zack: "Heh."_

_Cloud: "Zack, you've been reading fanfiction on fan sites?"_

_Zack: "Yeah, it's pretty cool! You should hop on one of the sites and check it out."_

Cloud turns a brilliant shade of red… I mean, pink… and coughs something that sounds suspiciously like _"tentacle porn"._

_Zack: "What?"_

_Cloud: "I said how much have you read?"_

_Zack: "Not really that much. I just found it before we went to Nibelheim. I'm really looking forward to getting back though. I think I saw my name in the summary for one of the Sephiroth stories."_

Cloud really is choking on an asphyxiating level now. Zack pounds his back helpfully. Cloud settles.

_Cloud: "Okay. I'm done. Just - warn me when you're going to start reading it again, okay?"_

_Zack: "Sure! 'Cause you want to read it too?"_

_Cloud: "Gaia, no! So I can make sure I turn off my cell phone so you can't call me once you realize what's going on."_

_Zack: "Why? What's going on?"_

_Cloud: "I can't – no, I can't even begin to explain. It's kind of like getting hit in the face with a frying pan. You've got to experience it for yourself."_

_Zack? "Eh? But… but the story I read was really good!"_

_Cloud: "And that's how they get you. You read a couple good ones and you think, 'hey, this is pretty fun' and the next thing you know you're hiding under a desk with your superior officer and your best friend mutating into monsters from the waist down but it's okay because you __loooove_ _them and _– " Breaks off with more choking noises._ "I can't. I – " _full body shudder_. "I've got to go snog Tifa. For a really long time. Until I pass out."_

Mystified Zack watches Cloud leaving.

_Zack: "But – but – are you sure you don't want to read it with me?"_

_Cloud, _hand over shoulder_: "**Not interested!"**_

_Zack: "Maaaaaan."_ Looks around_. "Hey – __you want to read with me?"_


	28. Chapter 28: His Dad

_I'm currently working on something else but, while waiting for the 'twist' to hit me, I wanted to do this too. It's partially because I've been looking up 'Yondaime' images online (lala495063 has a heartbreaking 'Yondaime and Naruto' vid on YouTube by the by) but mostly it's the fault of Iskra revoir who long ago asked me to write a 'young Cloud' ficlet for her because her Tifa plushie needed someone since her Cloud plushies (short of the 'game-time' one at least) seem shy about snuggling. 'Kid Cloud' however has been surprisingly hard to catch to write down for me and even now I'm not entirely sure about how this turned out. Sorry, Iskra, 'young Cloud' is wiggly but hopefully this is plushie enough. ;) I'm going to leave when in the timeline this comes as up for grabs.  
_

**His Dad**

By TamLin

His dad was the strongest dad in the whole wide world! He rode a black chocobo called Smoke and he killed monsters for a living. There were little villages all over the continent – no… all over the world! – that knew his dad's name and cheered whenever they heard it. Sometimes… sometimes on cold winter nights around the pub they'd tell stories about his dad and how brave and strong he was. How – how his dad had saved the village and the people and – and the mayor's pretty daughter from marauding monsters…

He hopped off his bed and went to the bookcase to pull out the dictionary. It was heavy and he dropped it in the middle of the worn wooden floor and sat down in front of it to look through.

He didn't know what 'marauding' meant but it always seemed to have to do with monsters and so he figured it must be bad. His mom said you shouldn't use a word if you didn't know what it meant though so he scowled and ran his finger down the small print on the pages, looking for what he wanted.

How did you spell 'marauding'?

Mannequins were giant dolls?

Marauding was: 'to rove or raid in search of plunder'.

He kind of liked the sound of that and he rolled it around in his head. He wanted to go marauding. It sounded dangerous and fun. His mom was still outside in the garden and so he went marauding into the kitchen looking for cookies. He wasn't supposed to have cookies before dinner but he thought that was the point of marauding. He marauded and marauded but was left without cookie plunder. It was when he turned around to go look up 'cookies' in the dictionary to see if it would give him a recipe so he could make more that he remembered what he'd been doing in the first place. Hefting the book up with both arms he carried it carefully back to the shelf.

He'd been thinking about his dad.

His brave dad. His noble dad. His strong and bold and powerful dad.

His dad who was better than Johnny's dad.

For some reason telling himself stories about his monster killing dad didn't seem that satisfying anymore. Johnny's dad owned the general store and he gave Johnny a whole gil once a week for helping sweep it out. Today Johnny had bought candy with it and shared it with his friends…

A swipe of his arm over his eyes was enough to prove he wasn't crying and he crawled back up onto his bed and rolled over to look out the window. He hadn't gotten any candy and he'd acted like he didn't care. He wasn't going to ask and beg for it like the other boys had. He was better than that. His mom said that weak people asked for things, strong people did it on their own and he'd certainly never heard his mom ask anyone for anything even when Mrs. Lockhart next door was cooking something that smelled really good and all his mom had on the stove was the same soup they'd had yesterday. Sometimes, if he put on just the right act and showed up at just the right time, Mrs. Lockhart would see him and ask him over for snacks in the afternoon.

She made the best cookies… which was probably why her little dark haired, dark eyed daughter that Cloud so secretly adored had turned out so pretty and sweet…

His mom made really good cookies too, he staunchly defended in his head, feeling disloyal and guilty. It made him want to go outside and disappear into the woods around the village but he was grounded and his mom said he couldn't go play outside today. He rolled over on his stomach and fiddled half-heartedly with his wooden soldiers.

He hated being trapped inside!

If his dad was here –

If his dad was here he'd probably be mad at him too…

He hadn't meant to run through Mr. Macon's flowers in front of the inn. He'd just – he'd been in a hurry and he hadn't been paying attention. He'd been fighting monsters in his head and –

And you'd think he'd done something unforgivable the way Mr. Macon had carried on and on!

They were just _flowers_ for pity's sake!

He'd ended up grounded all the same. And now he was stuck inside with nothing to do all because of some dumb flowers.

His mom had been really embarrassed.

He felt guilty about that…

If he had a dad he bet his mom wouldn't have had to feel embarrassed.

He buried his face in the crook of his arms and shut his eyes tight. 'Cause he didn't really have a dad. As much as he wanted to pretend - his dad wasn't a monster slayer. He just… wasn't. He wasn't here, he wasn't part of their family, he wasn't interested in hanging around. He wasn't going to tell Mr. Macon to shut up about the flowers, he wasn't going to make everything okay for Mom, he wasn't going to come home and…

He just wasn't.

His dad was one big 'wasn't'.

His dad had always been a big 'wasn't'.

His face set in determination in the shadow of his thin arms. **He** wasn't going to be a wasn't. He was going to be a _was_. And he'd come home and he'd make sure nobody yelled at his family about flowers and he'd –

He'd take care of them.

Even if he didn't know exactly how… he'd find a way… he'd take care of them…

****

"Cloud?"

The sound came from the doorway and he barely kept himself from spinning over automatically to face it. He barely remembered in time that he'd fallen asleep on the couch and if he rolled over, he'd roll right off and onto the floor and that threats didn't usually whisper his name in little kids' voices in the middle of the night.

Why was he sleeping on the couch…?

Right. Tifa. Gone for the weekend. Kids and him – on their own. With a grunt he sat up and focused on the archway to the steps and the upstairs rooms. Denzel, flyaway hair even more flyaway than usual, stood hesitantly in the doorway, shifting from foot to foot. Cloud's internal clock informed him of the impossibly late hour even as he swung his long legs off the couch and scrubbed a hand through his hair.

The males of the family never slept well on the rare occasions Tifa was gone. Cloud couldn't even bring himself to sleep in their shared bed without her warmth there…

At his silent waiting, Denzel fidgeted and then shuffled over. Without a word, he crawled up onto the couch next to Cloud and scooted into the shelter of the larger man's side. Cloud wrapped an arm around the child and didn't ask.

He'd had enough nightmares to know what they looked like on someone else.

With a sigh he shifted backward. Sometimes Denzel just needed a sheltering body in order to get back to sleep but when he sat back this time, Denzel went with him but stayed stiff and forcibly awake.

That bad of a nightmare, huh? His arm tightened just a bit more around the boy's slim frame.

A real dad would know what to do to make everything right.

Without Tifa by his side to silently encourage him though, Cloud felt lacking. It didn't matter how many times she told him that simply being himself was enough for the kids… he knew he should be doing more for them. Denzel gave a sigh and unconsciously, Cloud echoed it himself.

A real dad would do… whatever it was that real dad's did to make the leftover, sick, shaking, clammy-stomach-fear go away. A real dad would know what to say to make the bad memories of the past stop bubbling up in the empty darkness of the night. A real dad would know how to make the tinges of green… or in Denzel's case, black… stay away from the edges of their eyes when they weren't paying attention.

In the shelter of his body, tucked in against his warmth, unnoticed, Denzel started to relax. Together they sat in silence in the dark for a little while, the two Strife males, and… it felt pretty good. Finally, Cloud looked down at the top of the kid's head – and, was it hypocritical to think automatically that the kid needed a haircut?

"Come on," his voice was low as he scooped the boy up and settled him onto his back. They were probably both too old for piggy-back rides but when Denzel's thin arms wound trustingly around his neck, something in Cloud relaxed. With a grunt, he headed for the kitchen.

"What're we doing?" Denzel's muffled voice came from between his shoulder blades and the corner of Cloud's mouth twitched upward. His answer was succinct.

"Marauding."

Lockhart hands still made the best cookies. Even, Cloud thought smugly, if her last name wasn't Lockhart anymore…


	29. Chapter 29: Pirates vs Ninjas

_this was a prompt in the annual Trick or Treat Kiss Battle contest that's going on over on _first_seventhe_'s LJ. I hadn't meant to write anything but I ran across a prompt for 'Cloud/Tifa - pirates'. I looked at Cloud and got one of his 'nh' sounds - which means he's not even going to justify my teasing with an actual word. But then Tifa started to snicker... and things just went downhill from there. Be warned - we took a bit of the mickey out of the prompt - though it will hopefully all be taken in good fun as it was intended. Though I usually avoid bringing cultural references, pop or otherwise, into my stories when I set them in another world (TWT wasn't meant to be a fluke) - this was just too hard to resist. Let's just call it AU for the sake of sanity. _

**Pirates vs. Ninjas**

by TamLin

"Boys shouldn't wear eyeliner."

Tifa looked over to find a disgruntled Cloud shutting the door to Seventh Heaven and stifled a laugh. The last of Marlene and Denzel's friends had left and the place was a mess. A good mess though that indicated a grand time had been had by all. For a first Halloween part after the geostigma incident, she was proud of how much fun all the children had had.

Even if they were going to have to get a ladder to get that caramel apple off of the ceiling…

She was pretty sure she didn't want to know how Reno, in the two minutes he'd been here 'delivering Shinra loot to the yappers, yo' had managed that.

Cloud rubbed the back of his head.

"How many Jack Barrows did we have anyway?" he asked, picking up an empty garbage bag and starting his chore of gathering up the cups and plates and left-over food.

"Jack Sparrow," Tifa corrected him. "And there were seven. If you counted Cait Sith."

Cloud's low throat noise was answer enough and Tifa found herself chuckling as she started to sweep the area. From upstairs came the sounds of Marlene and Denzel dividing the candy they'd collected. It was a good sound. A family sound. Maybe, Tifa thought, they really were figuring out how to be a real family…

"Is Sorrel supposed to be drunk all the time?" Cloud wanted to know. For a man that, as the children informed her, was awesomely cool, the blond had very little awareness of the latest fads. Nor did he seem interested in catching up on them either. She had long ago added that to just one more thing she loved about him. Right now though, he was apparently still chewing over all the tiny pirates with slurs and femininely waving hands that had invaded his home for the past few hours. Tifa laughed at him.

"Sparrow. And… it's the character. He was… eccentric. A lot of girls find him very attractive, you know."

That caught his attention and she was treated to a cocked blue eye from the edge of his face.

"He wears eyeliner."

It was so adorable, she had to turn around so she wouldn't laugh too obviously.

"Some girls find him hot," she tossed over her shoulder. She heard the distinctive sound of the garbage bag meeting the floor and turned to see Cloud crossing his arms over his chest, eyes narrow.

"Why?" he wanted to know.

"Well," she tapped her fingers on the handle of her broom. "Because he's… he's…" she wrinkled her nose at him. "Because he doesn't take things too seriously."

Cloud was unimpressed.

"Neither does Reno."

"Some girls think Reno is cute," Tifa defended and the look Cloud gave her indicated he didn't count loonies as viable sources of opinion.

"Maybe it's because he's unpredictable and dangerous," Tifa offered another idea. Cloud's gaze remained flat and his arms remained folded over his chest.

"Some women are attracted to you because you're dangerous," she felt compelled to point out. Cloud's pale brows quirked down.

"I'm not dangerous. Anymore," he sounded like a little boy as he said it and she came around to stand in front of him and put her hands on his muscled forearms.

"You're only dangerous to bad things that would hurt people you love," her voice softened as she said it. "It makes a woman feel safe, knowing that you're scarier than the things that scare her."

His eyes were young and vulnerable when they met hers under the fringe of his bangs.

"You're not scared of me."

She sensed the wound, old and barely healed, just waiting to be reopened. She refused to let it have anymore pain and _never_ from her. Instead, she pushed his arm and laughed at him.

"Cloud Strife, you're feeling threatened by a fictional pirate in eyeliner. Of course, I'm not scared of you."

"I am not," he protested but the wound was safe and she laughed again as she went back to where she'd propped her broom against the counter. When she turned around, he was right there though and she remembered how silent he could be when he wasn't making it a point to make noise. His hands settled on the bar counter on either side of her and he lowered his head.

"You don't like guys in eyeliner." His voice was sliding toward dark golden honey and she felt her knees go a little bit weak. Lips pressed together, she shook her head.

"You like the fact I don't flop my wrists," he continued, crowding her a little bit more so that his natural warmth reacted with the warmth his proximity always flushed through her. She did like his wrists. She really, really liked his strong, solid, sleek, muscled wrists…

"You can even touch my hair without worrying about when I washed it last and what's living in it since," he continued, mouth very, very close to hers, and her lips quirked even as her joints flushed with hot oil and went loose. His voice was black velvet.

"You can kiss me without worrying about cutting your tongue up on my snaggled, gold plate teeth…"

"Cloud…" she was either going to burst into laughter or melt into a puddle of goo. His low laugh was pure male satisfaction and his lips moved so close to hers she could feel his exhale.

"Want to try?" he asked and she nodded without embarrassment or hesitation, hand dropping the broom so her arms could snake around his shoulders. One of his rare but no longer impossible smiles peeked through.

"Me too," he agreed and lowered his mouth. Less than a blink away from completing the move, the door to Seventh Heaven suddenly crashed open and Cloud's new least favorite ninja in the entire world staggered into the bar. Complete with dread lock wig, gaudy pirate outfit, drawn on beard, and yes – eyeliner.

"Why is all the rum gone?" Yuffie slurred cheerfully.


	30. Chapter 30: Stray IV

_for all my reviewers who asked (and begged and whined and threatened and bribed) ~ this one is for ya'll._

**Stray IV**

by TamLin

He tugged her down the sidewalk.

She came after him, barely hanging on, and calling at him to slow down. She was laughing though. If she was laughing then she wasn't mad. He grinned and kept going, strong muscles easily winning against her light resistance. People saw him coming and moved out of their way and he kept grinning, a huge, lolling thing that seemed to scare more people than amuse them. That was funny too.

"Slow down, you overgrown puppy – I'm so sorry," she was calling to him and apologizing to everyone else at the same time. He bunched his shoulders and surged forward suddenly. She was expecting it though. He'd done it often enough and soon she was running along behind him, cheerfully calling him the worst names. It made his heart swell in his chest. It made him happy. He gave a crooning sound that melted into the crowded, overhung streets with their snapping neon lights and their dark recessed doors.

"We are _not_ eating at that corner deli again," she informed him, a bit breathless and he slowed down enough to cast a look at her over his shoulder, blue eyes laughing.

"I don't care if they slip you extra, I can't take another meatball sub," she informed him pertly.

She was so pretty.

He liked the way her eyes always laughed at him. It was nice laughter. They were nice eyes.

If she had a tail – she'd be perfect.

He slowed down to a stroll so she could catch her breath and fell in next to her.

"You're such a puppy," she teased him. "Don't tell me you got into another bag of sugar."

He winked an eye at her and received giggles in return. He liked her giggles. They made his chest feel bubbly. Then her hand fell on his head and she ruffled his hair affectionately. He leaned into her touch but kept moving. Pretty girl or not, now that he was all better, he needed to find Cloud.

He'd remembered why last night while he'd been sleeping. It had been murder on him having to wait until their evening walk. Now he guided them toward a different section of the city. The last time he'd found Cloud's trail, it had been heavy around a bar there. Last time he'd gone past, the place had been closed but that had been early in the day. This time they were bound to be open.

He'd start looking for his blond friend there.

The pretty girl strolled along next to him, content to let him lead. She never cared where they went in the evening. He liked that about her. She didn't have to have a destination in mind. She was okay with just wandering.

And after their stroll, maybe she'd take one of those baths with all the bubbles in the tub.

He liked watching her with all those bubbles…

Her hand bopped him on the top of his head. He blinked up at her, startled out of his reminisce.

"Your eyes are glazing over," she reprimanded him with a laugh. "And we're still not getting meatball subs again."

He gave her a lopsided grin and paused to scent the air to get his bearings. He was good with finding things. He could keep things in his head even when he wasn't aware he was doing it. She clasped her hands behind her and twirled while she waited. He nosed her knee and huffed out air. She laughed again.

"We're going somewhere specific, aren't we?" she asked him, skipping a few steps next to him as they started moving again. "It better not be a dumpster, Coal."

He made a coughing noise in the back of his throat and rolled his eyes to innocently look up at her. The look she returned said she wasn't buying his act. He grinned at her again and kept going.

Cloud's scent started to thicken then and he inhaled it deep. It made… it made his chest feel better. It made him feel like he could breathe again. He couldn't say that he'd missed his friend… it was just that – things were better now.

Things were better.

The scent was territorial around the bar as he slowed to a stop. Sitting down directly in front of the door, he gave the building a careful perusal. Cloud wouldn't spend time in a building that didn't have multiple exits. If he was cautious -

_Cloud_ was paranoid.

There was also that strange female scent mixed in with Cloud's. He'd smelled it last time too. It was a puzzle. Cloud was shy. Or anti-social. Not having that problem himself, it was hard for him to figure out the difference. Either way there were a distinct lack of females in Cloud's life. Or males. Or... anyone really. This one… this one…

He narrowed his eyes at the way the scents mingled.

The pretty girl squatted down on her heels next to him and looked at the closed door as well. After a minute, she asked:

"Are we going in?"

It pulled him out of his puzzling and he grunted as he stood up. If Cloud wasn't inside… he'd be nearby. Next to him, the pretty girl straightened up as well. He liked her. She didn't ask why. She just walked over to the door and pushed it open for both of them.

It was a small bar and it was busy but not uncomfortably crowded. He stood just inside the closed door and took things in.

The crowd was mostly males in groups of twos and threes. They talked companionably, as if they were old familiars catching up on the same repetitive day with the same repetitive responses. There weren't many of them that reeked of alcohol and despair the way some bar patrons did. Past the small tables was the counter that held the bar proper and the stools. People sat on the stools and talked to the girl behind the bar as she made drinks.

He noticed two things right away.

One: there was no flash of yellow. Cloud wasn't here.

And two: he got mild looks and then everyone went back to their drinks and talk. He tucked his chin a little. That was… weird. Usually when someone his size and shape walked into a place this crowded full of bitable ankles and butts, there was at least _some _nervous shifting. He wondered forlornly if he was losing his touch. Didn't he look scary anymore…?

"Poor Coal," the pretty girl's nice hand landed gently on his head and she stroked. "You look disappointed. Did you think this was a deli?"

He exhaled a ragged sound and put his nose to the floor. Following a trail only he could find, he started weaving through the tables and chairs. The pretty girl apologized as people moved their chairs for him.

He ended up at the bar counter, near the last stool next to the wall and he pushed himself up onto his hind legs and braced his front paws against the edge of the counter. Narrowing his eyes, he fixed them on the girl rinsing out glasses and gave a coughing sound that was his equivalent of a dog's 'woof'.

The girl behind the counter turned and as she did her long hair swung. He caught her scent. His eyes went wide.

_She_ was the female scent wrapped around Cloud's. More – he could smell Cloud's scent mingled in the scent of her hair. And she didn't focus on the pretty girl. Instead she focused on him.

Her eyes went just as big as his.

Intent they both stared at what they saw there, across the surface of the bar.

She had opal red flecks in her dark eyes.

She smelled like Cloud. On her _skin_! Her **_skin_ **smelled like **_Cloud_**. He moved his nose forward, just a little, still unsure and she pulled back. Fear flickered in her eyes and across her skin and he pulled back with a whine. He was a good dog!

"He's a good dog," the pretty girl was suddenly back in his awareness and she stroked his head. "I know he looks like a beast but he's really just a big sissy. He even sleeps in bed with me every night."

The other girl blinked and turned her attention on the pretty girl.

"Really?" she asked but there was something in her tone. He saw the way she slanted her eyes toward him and he suddenly had the urge to whimper. That look said he'd been caught.

"Oh yes," was the cheerful, unsuspecting reply. "And he takes up far more than his fair share of the bed too."

"You know…" the girl behind the bar began, "I have the exact same problem…"

The sound of the door being pushed open saved him. For a second. Until he was hit by a wave of aggression so strong it made the hair on his back and neck stand automatically. Across the room he felt more than heard the rumbling growl of warning. It was purely predatory and it clearly stated 'Mine'. The beast in him took over and he found himself back down on all fours, teeth bared and turned to face the threat.

And then the closing door brought the scent to him and he was torn. Because – he knew that scent and it made his tail wag. But it was angry and that made his ruff rise. The tension between the man and the beast inside him was too much and he snapped out a sound, part bark, part roar.

The tables and chairs in front of him suddenly cleared like magic.

Cloud stalked forward but he was in man form. It did absolutely nothing to ease the threat he projected. In the dim interior, his blue eyes held lightening storms of blue electric.

Paws braced on the linoleum flooring, he whined under the tension, beast fighting with the man inside him for dominance. He'd never been good at not letting the beast part of him win.

"Z-zack?" Cloud's voice sounded as if he was trying to remember how to use it but – it helped. It was a good voice. A voice his beast knew. A Cloud voice. He whined again and hunched forward. Cloud went to a knee in front of him and held out his arms.

"Come here," his voice was calm and low. Unwavering. It brought the man back inside the beast. He pushed forward and slammed his head into his friend's chest and heard the grunt. Arms went around him and he felt a face pressed into his fur but it was okay. It was all okay. It was better than okay because it was Cloud. Aware now, he smelled the fear from the girl behind him receding and at the exact moment it began to, he smelled the aggressive danger of his friend calming. Strong fingers dug into him, skin and fur. It felt good and he pushed closer. Cloud didn't like being touched in his wolf form but he did. Especially by Cloud who had the best fingers in the whole world because they knew exactly where to scratch. He'd even tried to get Cloud to grow his fingernails out so he could scratch even better but he'd just gotten a narrow glare.

"Don't scare her." Cloud's voice was still low and calm but he heard how very thin the tension of control in it was. He made a throaty noise in response and Cloud rubbed his face against his fur.

"I can't – I can't control myself when she's afraid, Zack. Not even for you."

"Is that his name? Zack?"

They both raised their heads and the pretty girl was standing there. He thought… he thought she looked lonely all of the sudden. She was smiling though.

"Does he belong to you? I knew he had to belong to somebody. He's too smart. I kind of took care of him for a little while. He was sick. Eating trash I think." She offered her end of the makeshift leash he used to drag her around more than she used to keep a hold of him. "I'm – I'm awfully glad you found him. Or he found you. He's a really good dog."

"He's been sleeping in her bed," the dry voice came from behind the counter and Zack felt the fluctuations that ran over his friend before the blond had even lifted his head at the dark girl's voice. The physical reactions in his friend to that sound made his eyes go wide. Which helped when Cloud speared him with a look. Big eyes helped make you look innocent. He blinked his big eyes for added effect and only got a narrow, blue-eyed look in response. He turned his puppy eyes on the pretty girl.

Except when she saw them she looked as if she was going to cry.

"He's a really good guy. I didn't mind. Even if he snores." She was smiling as she went to her knees and ruffled the top of his head with one of her nice hands. Then she stood up again and dusted off her hands. Zack knew that move. That was her 'I'm leaving now' move! He strained forward without actually moving and whined.

"Well – I'll be leaving now," she smiled brightly. "I'm glad you found your dog." She wagged a finger at him. "Don't eat out of any more dumpsters, you hear me?"

She was leaving! But… she wasn't supposed to leave. She was supposed to stay too! So he could have Cloud _and_ the pretty girl. He whined in his throat and Cloud reacted.

"Wait!"

The pretty girl turned back and blinked at him. Cloud looked suddenly trapped. He'd reacted on instinct to Zack's need but hadn't had time to think beyond that.

"He's – ah… he's not mine," the blond began and Zack snorted. Damn straight, he wasn't Cloud's. In truth, his kind didn't belong to anyone. They just – hung out sometimes…

"He's… um… a friend of mine's. Who's – out of town. Right now…"

Zack made a disgruntled noise. Cloud was such a lousy liar.

"Cloud means we don't have room for him in our apartment," the dark girl behind the bar spoke up. She was drying glasses. Zack gave her a hopeful look.

He got a warning glance in return. It was a look from garnet eyes that said she knew his tricks. He put on his most innocent face.

"Oh?" the pretty girl moved back and she looked hopeful. She squatted back down next to Cloud and unconsciously reached out to stroke Zack's head. He leaned into it but didn't move out of Cloud's arms, which still hadn't let go of him. He thought the world was just about perfect.

They just needed some meatball subs to make it that way.

"It's a really small place," the girl behind the counter continued. "So while we could take him until our… friend gets back… I don't think he'd be very happy there. Is there any way - ?"

"I could take him," the pretty girl offered and Zack opened his mouth to pant happily. Cloud's arms tightened around him and he grunted but it was a good feeling. Cloud could turn back into his regular shape and then he could come too. Except his friend would have to sleep on the couch…

"Could you?" the girl behind the counter was really good at sounding both surprised and sincere. "I can't tell you how wonderful that would be. Of course, as soon as our friend showed up, we'd come and get him." Her eyes narrowed and she shot Zack a look. "Our friend's a bit of a pervert and we'd hate to let him bother you."

Zack gave her a shocked look and tried to ignore the fact that Cloud was doing that silent coughing thing of his that meant he was laughing. The pretty girl giggled.

"Maybe his dog picked it up. Sometimes I swear I catch him watching me change."

Zack squeezed his eyes shut and whined. The conversation was really starting to get him into trouble. Besides… he hadn't realized she'd known he was just pretending to sleep while he looked…

Cloud's strong hand closed over his muzzle, locking his muzzle and jaw together. He let his ears slump and whined again but Cloud still gave him a firm shake. It was only a playing dominant move but it was still reprimand.

"Idiot," his friend muttered under his breath but Zack perked up one ear. Because it sounded like his friend was calling him an idiot for getting caught, not for peeking.

"You have to watch those dog boys," the girl behind the counter leaned forward on her elbows on the bar top and her voice was both chiding and teasing. The way she was leaning gave Zack a nice view that hinted at but didn't entirely give away the soft curves that the neckline of her shirt revealed. He suddenly found his head forcibly snapped down so that all he could look at was the floor.

Cloud however, didn't drop his eyes at all.

"All that running around in the wilds makes them a little kinky." Her voice wasn't even directed at the pretty girl or him anymore and he felt the way it moved over his blond friend's skin and tripped over the muscles underneath. His eyes, still stuck looking at the floor, actually widened in shock at the rush of heat and emotion that flushed through Cloud. There was a mix of absolute bottomless hungry darkness and the lightest laughter in his friend's scent suddenly, so strong and overwhelming that it made his own skin tickle under his fur as if he were standing too close to a lightening strike. He wiggled at the way it made his nerves tingle and Cloud remembered to let him out of his headlock.

"Can you wait for us?" Cloud's voice was directed at the pretty girl as he stood up but his eyes were still on the girl behind the bar and, even as intently focused as Zack had seen his friend before, there was no comparison to what was in his eyes now. The girl behind the bar had straightened up and she cocked an eye at the blond, half warning, half unsure comprehension.

"Um, okay," the pretty girl responded. "I guess you probably need to know where I live if I'm going to keep your friend's dog." The girl behind the counter's lips were starting to part and she was backing up, eyes flickering a surprisingly weak warning at the man across from her. "Maybe we could pick up dinner after you get off work here and – "

"Good," Cloud's one word answer was a grunt and he planted a hand on the counter top.

"Cloud – " the girl on the other side of that counter warned, hand rising to point a finger at him.

"Zack," Cloud's voice had dropped an entire tone and gone to gravel. "Stay."

It was a good thing humans didn't really see what happened in front of them, Zack thought, as his friend vaulted the bar as if it were a fallen log. No human moved that smoothly.

"Cloud!" there was just the hint of a 'bad dog!' in the dark haired girl's voice before his friend had her off her feet and against him, mouth over hers. There was the sound of falling glass breaking, several thumps and Zack popped himself up on his hind legs, paws against the edge of the bar again, just in time to see his friend, wrapped in dark hair and pale skin all but fall backward through a door that led off into another room behind the counter.

Only a second or two later the largest man Zack had ever seen came staggering out of that door, dark skin changed to bright red and using the most guttural language Zack had ever heard.

The curses were the only sound in the entire bar. Until there was the sound of something that sounded like pots or pans falling to the floor in the other room.

"What the hell you fools gaping at?!" the black man bellowed, waving two arms the thickness of full sized trees. "Ya here ta drink or what?!"

There was a general rustling and shuffling and the voices of the customers rose to close to their usual muted tone. Zack did hear a share of whistles, grunts, and 'told you so' smattered in the conversation though. He grinned, tongue lolling and the big man looked at him.

"Aw, shit. 'Nother one of you flea bags?"

Zack gave him a pleased huffing sound and his pretty girl settled onto the stool next to him. Her cheeks were a little flushed looking but she was grinning too.

"It looks like we might be here for a while," she told Zack and he made a pleased sound. Turning to the man behind the counter, she asked:

"Do you have any fruit juice?"

"Course we do," he grunted, reaching for a broom to clean up the broken glasses while he muttered something that sounded like 'fuckin' rabbits' under his breath. "Gimme a minute an' I'll get you some."

"Thank you," his pretty girl was as polite and cheerful as ever and Zack contentedly rested his head in her lap. She scratched her fingers through his fur and he let his eyes close in bliss at the drag of her long nails.

At least she hadn't told them about the baths with the bubbles in them…


	31. Author's Note III

…_this is an author's note…..it is only an author's note….since this is a real note these lines will be followed by important story information….I repeat….this is only an author's note…_

Several things so let's get right down to them.

~ I've got a new chaptered story I'm going to be putting up called **Vermillion**. It would be muchly, muchly appreciated if my gentle readers would go and check it out. It's not Final Fantasy but I think the male character will be enjoyable enough to help greatly and let's face it – marketing-wise lots of reviews for a first chapter tend to assure people the story is worth reading ;) That's right! I'm trying to get you to help me in tricking those poor unsuspecting Naruto fans into reading my story! Bwhahahaha! - er (shifty glance)... onward -

~ ObsessiveCompulsiveValkyrie has changed the title of the story she wrote as the companion piece to 'Taking Care'. It is now titled '**Of Mako and Promises**' so everyone that is looking for it, that's where it's gone. If you haven't read it - and 'Skirts, Shoes, and SOLDIER' as well as 'Dichroic' - well, you get a *tsk, tsk* and a pitying head shake from me. You're missing out on some awesome reading!

~ And, lastly – as a thank you (and a dip into masochism) I'm going to attempt one of those 50 word, one sentence a piece prompts. If you've seen them, you know what I'm talking about – if not, you will when I *****cough***** attempt one. But because you guys are all so wonderful and as my way of saying 'thank you' I'd like to take fifty of your prompts. One word only, any word, and no hints about what I'm supposed to do with that word (I can see some of you corkers pulling out your dictionaries even as we speak - don't think I don't see that! It's evil... I LIKE it!). You can give me a couple words if you like, just drop them to me in the form of reviews or messages through ffnet and make sure you leave enough room for everyone else. This is my own twisted version of the 'first ten people to ask' prompt that's floating around the LJ community.

~ as a ps – yes, there is another chapter of 'Stray' in the works and no, I will not be abandoning my FTOG drabbles in favor of **Vermillion**. Fear not, gentle readers and best beloveds, my muses are in the process of playing 'no, she loves ME more' and it seems everyone wants to be written now instead of nicely taking turns. It's a good thing they're all so hot - er, I mean, cute...

…_we now return you to your regularly scheduled reading…thank you…_


	32. Chapter 32: Stray V

_ta da! As promised, Stray V. I gave my best beloveds who reviewed_ Vermillion_ for me an early showing of this chapter (except for you Ruby, I couldn't find anywhere to send your invite; sorry, oh best beloved) and it seemed to go over well. Brace up though, things double back in this chapter. In the meantime, I've also got a new journal over on LiveJournal. The link to it is at my homepage here so it's easy to find. I wanted somewhere I could post my stories as backup in case anything ever happens with ffnet - I'd hate to lose touch with all my readers. Keep tabs on me there for first updates and such. Also - sorry, Peeka - I couldn't wait any longer. Had to get this up now. And hey, I've still got room in my fifty word prompt for suggestions, gentle readers. We're a little over half the way there and I'd like to get it done in time for Christmas so if you were holding off because you didn't want to take up anyone else's allotment - go right ahead. And now - _

**Stray V**

by TamLin

They run.

It isn't how the night started.

The night started thick and wet and hot, filled with the sizzle of neon lights and open doorways spilling white out into the sidewalks beyond. It began with the sound of too many people crowded too close and the honk of cars and the sizzle of food and the murmur of a hundred inconsequential conversations. It was the smell of greasy food, oil, unwashed bodies and stale water – of incongruous flowers and slightly wet fur and his girl smelling like a fruity mixed drink she'd spilled a bit of on her wrist, the clean, soft smell of the soap she used… and him.

Tonight had started with a long fingered, much loved hand in his and the happy chatter that fell like rain from a flower girl walking next to a furred out and grinning Zack.

Tonight had started out perfect.

Dinner had been meatball subs and as they'd sat at the wobbly plastic table and eaten them, Zack had rested his head on one of his thighs and his girl's hand had kept slipping down to curve over his other. The food had been good. The companionship had been better. Everything that was important to him in the world had been nearby. Touchable. Viewable.

Protectable…

It had been good.

It had been normal.

It had been human.

He should have remembered what happened to his world when it was perfect…

Now they run passed broken down brothels where whores peer hollow eyed and scared from the swallowing doorways, passed drug dens where thugs are already starting to marshal together in drug hazed defense of their territory, passed boarded up windows and doorways that leak smells of filth and sometimes death. Two pairs of boots and four padding paws. And in his chest the rage is a slow, climbing burn that is only held in check by the feel of his dark haired girl's hand in his.

He has lost himself once before to that rage. He remembers. He remembers the consuming fire of it, the caving hole in his chest where his heart had been, the way the madness had wrapped dark fingers around his mind until everything had hazed and nothing had made sense and it hadn't mattered. Nothing had mattered but locking his jaws around something solid and never letting go.

"Cloud!"

The gasped sound wrenches him from the fires in his mind where white fur mixes with greasy black and the laughter is raw and comes from elongated throats. It brings him to a stop as if it is a command and his dark haired girl is suddenly colliding with him and his arms are around her and her body is soft and safe and whole in his arms. She is soft and safe and whole and he pulls back into a boarded over doorway and buries his nose in her hair.

She smells like smoke. And blood. But it isn't her blood.

It isn't hers.

She is panting, chest heaving from the speed and the distance, but her arms are still tight as they twist around him and her nails dig in to the fabric of his shirt. She has drying tears on her cheeks, and, not running anymore, he leans down and brushes them away with his tongue.

Her tears taste like fire and yet they soothe the flames threatening to combust inside his head. Stars are made of fire. He thinks that stars probably taste like her tears.

Teeth fasten on his calf and they aren't gentle even if they don't break the fabric or puncture his skin. He draws away, just enough to look down, from his girl and sees Zack and the huddled mass clinging to his back.

The flower girl. She is still crying but the sounds are small now and broken. It makes his chest ache the way a crying pup does and he lets go of his girl to lean down and lift the other woman into his embrace. He doesn't like touching… but she needs it and she smells enough like Zack that his body doesn't react violently to the feel of her against it. He has to pry her because her fingers are clutching Zack's fur so tightly that some of it comes away with her when he lifts her off his friend's back but Zack doesn't flinch or make any noise passed the whining low in his throat that he's been making all along. Lilies fill his nose and she transfers her clutching fingers from Zack to the front of his shirt, still making those broken, quiet sounds that made his chest ache. Zack is pressing his nose into her side and whining and he turns his head from the two of them to find his dark haired girl again.

She is standing close but she is not touching him and her arms are tight around herself as she looks back the way they have come. The dark sky is black with smoke that glows on its underside with the color of flames.

His girl is rubbing absently at the center of her chest where he has often kissed a scar the shape of an oversized imprint of fangs.

He wants to kiss it again now, to prove to her that it is old and she is safe but his arms are full of flowers and tears.

The flower girl's mother is dead and all of her flowers are burning somewhere back in the darkness they have fled from. Cloud has seen hunters dress and hang deer before. He has never seen it done to a human until now. He knows tonight in his sleep, the older woman's face will become his girl's in his nightmares and the ruined body will become familiar.

He thinks he will make it a point not to sleep anytime soon.

The flower girl is starting to quiet in his arms and her body is starting to go slack. He thinks that she is too hurt to stay awake and feel it anymore and he tightens his hold on her so that she will not fall when she passes out. She mumbles something he can't understand against his chest and turns the side of her head to rest it in the curve of his shoulder, eyes closed and face streaks of alternating white and black where her tears and Zack's fur have washed away the soot. He looks down at Zack but sees mostly beast in the concerned blue eyes.

Of all their kind, he is the only one that has no beast inside him to revert to or to tell him what to do when things get confusing. He thinks… sometimes he thinks it is because he has been the beast all along…

He picks the flower girl up in his arms. Lilies tickle his nostrils again and he wonders if she is part flower to smell so strongly of them. Zack rises from his haunches when he picks up the girl and he looks down at the black wolf and orders:

"Shelter."

The wolf dips its nose toward the ground and begins to search. He turns his head and sees his girl still watching back the way they've come. Perhaps they should have stayed, perhaps they shouldn't have run. But the flames had been spreading so fast, leaping from rotting building to rotting building and the police had started to arrive. He hasn't been here long but he has already learned how dangerous the police are in this place. They are less for the protection of the people that live here and more to keep them in place and toothless. They enjoy their job too much.

Zack makes a noise and starts forward and he turns his head and speaks his girl's name.

"Tifa – "

Her face is pale when she turns it to him and what he sees in her eyes makes him ache deep in the hollow where his heart is. He catches the whine before it can exit his throat. He is restless and anxious and people he cares about are hurting and he can't make it stop or drive it away. He wants to sink his teeth into something and he wants to bury himself in his girl's arms and he can't do either. Zack 'woof's impatiently at him and he turns to follow, ears hurting until he hears the soft footsteps of his girl behind him.

As dangerous as the streets are and as obviously hampered by a limp body as their group is no one bothers them from the dark cracks and hollow doorways of this section of the city. He almost wishes someone would. It would help the coiling need to _hurt _someone for doing this to people he cares about.

Because… he recognizes the scent that lay so thick around the slaughterhouse. It is a metallic taste on his tongue and in the back of his throat still. He knows that metal and ice smell and he knows the monster it belongs to.

Somehow… he has always known that the silver furred wolf survived their last fight. All the years between then and now… he still knows that scent as if he were inhaling it for the first time.

The first time he smelled that scent, it had been wrapped around his dark eyed girl's terror and pain and blood. It makes his lips draw back from his teeth now. He'd wanted the other wolf dead then.

He still wants it dead now.

Zack comes to a stop in front of a run-down novelty shop that sells items of a questionable nature. The wolf sniffs at the locked door for a minute and then trots around toward the back of the shop and he follows, wondering how his friend discovered this place and then deciding he doesn't want to know. The back door is locked too but Zack paws at a brick in the wall until the dark haired girl goes down on her heels next to him and wiggles it loose. There's a key and she takes it and unlocks the door. He hesitates in the doorway, trying to smell passed the lilies so he can get an idea of what to expect inside the room. Zack trots in without compunction and, when nothing eats him, they follow.

The back of the shop is homey and divided from the slightly threatening items set up for sale in the front. His dark haired girl shuts and locks the door behind them once they're inside and he loves her because she is sensible and intelligent and capable. There is only one bed in the back room, a thin, narrow thing that sags in the middle. It smells like old man and he lays the flower girl down into it. Zack moves over to rest his chin on the bed for a minute and watch her. He watches his friend do so and then he turns his head and sneezes viciously, trying to clear the flower smell from his nose.

Something is wrong with his girl and he doesn't know what it is.

There is a small kitchen in the same room as the bed and a patched armchair and she is searching cabinets and drawers near the sink. Her back is to him and she's not dancing the way she usually does when she moves. He understands how the joy has left her movements but not how the grace has and it makes his chest ache. He steps in close to her and traps her between his body and the sink. She goes still but she doesn't turn and so he rests his chin over her shoulder. Her hand doesn't come up to touch his hair the way it should.

Darkness flares in him and it's flames too but not the burning madness of before. He slides his hands in and then down over her, pulling her back against himself and begins to nip, light and warning, at her throat. Her body shivers and the growl in his throat answers the move. Something has hurt her and he will find it and hurt it in return.

Her hands come up then and so do her arms, so that she is reaching back over herself to hold him. It eases the tightness in his chest and he turns her so that she can wrap herself around him, pressing forward to trap her in the safety between his body and the cabinets.

"You smell like flowers," she says against his throat and in response he rubs his cheek and then his throat against her. Her body melts for his but her arms are strong and her fingers are claws that dig deep and refuse to let go. He doesn't want her to let go. His world goes hazy at its edges, the way it always does when he's pressed against her and he uses his hands to press her body closer into his.

The smell of the silver wolf reminds him of loss and horror and guilt and a pain so deep his mind couldn't bear to remember it.

It reminds him of how empty he was without his girl.

It reminds him that, while he lost her for a little while, he almost lost her for good to cold skin and dead dreams and blood that stopped flowing, warm and alive and strong through her veins.

She shudders out a sigh and she is all right again. Her body sways with his and he feels his own breathing relax and loosen. He presses his fingers into her skin and hears the little sound she makes that says she likes that, that she needs that. He needs that. And then, head on his shoulder, she mutters:

"Put some clothes on, Zack."

He turns them so that she is staring at the wall now and he can give his friend a narrow look. Zack has shifted into human form but the beast is still lurking in his ice colored eyes. He watches as his friend stands up and paces – and he wonders what kind of clothes Zack would find in a shop like this to wear if he was going to get dressed.

"Was that him?" Zack snaps the sounds out, as if he is biting at flies and for some reason his friend's restlessness helps Cloud find the cold, calm center inside himself.

"You told me about him. Was that him?" Zack stops pacing to glare at him but the anger isn't directed his way and so he lets it wash over his head and onward. Instead he nods, just once, a tuck of his chin.

"Sephiroth…" Zack hisses the name and his own eyes narrow in automatic response.

The silver hunter. The demon hound. The snake-eyed destroyer of his world – his perfect world – so many years ago. The monster that had tried to take his girl away from him, the beast that had taught him just how dark and vicious he was inside himself. In his arms, his girl shivers.

"Is that his name?" she whispers and he simply tightens his arms around her a little bit more. Somehow – he realizes that she too knows that what burned fragile flowers and slaughtered an old woman tonight is the same creature that took her from her house so many years ago. He realizes she is shivering and remembers, suddenly, that he never went into her house. He never found out what happened to her father…

He lowers his head and closes his teeth tightly over her shoulder, careful not to clench them too tightly. Her fingers knot in his hair but she stops shivering. He gives a light squeeze and feels her go weak for him at the familiarity of the gesture he's used on her to soothe her so many times in the past few weeks while he has made love to her.

"Hojo said he was coming. I didn't think he'd come after her mother."

His teeth leave her at his friend's words and his head snaps up. His eyes blaze blue electric and he feels the familiar, screaming, roaring sound rushing to fill his ears and his mind. His teeth bare and, inexplicably, lengthen and sharpen in his mouth and he snarls something so guttural it loses its human meaning but the message is clear.

Zack _will _tell him where he saw Hojo – and then Cloud will go rip the damnation's throat out.

Hard, fingers tug on the hair at the nape of his neck, and it sends jolts down through his system. It is another intimate move, one she uses when she is lost in him and needs him, him, just him…

It breaks him out of the blood haze over his vision, body's reactions suddenly clamoring for something entirely different than death and revenge and he grunts in response. Zack, seeing the moment is passed, drops down to sit on the edge of the bed next to the flower girl and runs his fingers through his shaggy hair.

"He was dying, Cloud. I – found him in an alley. He was – sick. Filthy. Half-changed. He said Sephiroth was coming. For everyone in Hojo's blood line and then the rest of us too." Zack's head swings back and forth in a shake. "I was going to find you – tell you – but I got sick. And then I – forgot." He looks ashamed but it is the beast. The beast has no memory or sense of the future. It only lives in the now of the moment. Cloud knows it and so he doesn't hold it against his friend. Zack has always lived easily lost to his beast. Besides… tonight it is not his girl that is lost or hurt. He thinks Zack will feel the guilt of that soon and he wishes he could make it otherwise. Zack is back on his feet and pacing again.

"I remembered – today. I found you and I was going to tell you. After we put the girls to bed."

They hadn't had the chance though. Instead they'd eaten and then gone back to the flower girl's house to find it ruined, her mother flayed and fire starting to eat everything. His jaw works at the memory and he runs his fingers over his girl's back.

"It's all right," he tells his distraught friend. "You couldn't have known he would go after the flowers. He should have come after me and you were with me. We should have been safe."

They had been. The flower girl's mother hadn't.

"Why?!" from Zack it is a howl and a demand at the same time and his friend lifts his hand as if he will hit the wall or one of the pieces of furniture. He lets his hand drop without violence though and softer, he whines deep in his throat. It makes Cloud's chest hurt.

"Why would he hurt her? Why would he do that to her mother?"

When his girl speaks, her voice is hollow.

"Because he's looking for a mate."

Cloud feels his stomach go cold and sick and he wraps himself further around his girl. Her voice stays dead.

"He does such terrible things so that you'll break. So that the shock will keep you from fighting him. He wants you to be weak. He has something inside him that he wants to be reborn. He is looking for a mate to make her carry that inside her."

Zack's eyes are wide in horror but it is nothing compared to the feeling seeping into Cloud's chest as his girl speaks her words to the empty wall behind him. Because… there is only one way she would know.

Her voice grows weaker but the grip of her fingers grows more desperate on him.

"I wouldn't let him… I wouldn't – so he – he dragged me outside – so he would have more time - I thought – I thought–" She starts hiccupping the sounds and so he picks her up in his arms. Her legs wind around his waist and he carries her over to the armchair and even though it smells like old man and greasy food, he sits down in it and buries his face in her hair. He is murmuring and it takes him a long moment to realize he is.

"I'm sorry. I was late. I'm sorry. I should have stayed. I'm sorry," he's telling her, saying it over and over against her throat but she starts shaking her head.

"Just in time," she whispers back and she presses closer against him. "You were just in time. Just in time…"

"But – " Zack's voice pops in and it's lost. "But Aerith wasn't there. She was with us. She was safe."

"He waits," his girl's voice is a whisper but the jerking hiccups are gone. "He does it – and then he waits - He waits in the house for you to come home and find – it."

"Bloody Shiva," Zack swears it low and Cloud feels the growl growing in the back of his throat. For all the sick games the creatures that destroyed his childhood played with him – one monster's methods surpass them all.

"He dies," he rumbles to Zack and his friend's voice is just as low as he adds:

"Slowly."


	33. Chapter 33: Pink

_after the last chapter of Stray - and with the natural stress that comes at this time of the year - I thought we could all use a break. This story was inspired by my nephew's reaction the first time he played FFVII._ _ Now sit back, relax, take a deep breath... and let Cloud do the hyperventilating for you._

**Pink**

by TamLin

Frankly, it was the pink that worried him.

Yes, he should probably be more concerned about certain other aspects – the most disturbing being how in the hell it happened in the first place – but mostly… it was the pink.

He hadn't worried about the pink so much at first – the aforementioned 'how the hell?!' being higher on his list of concerns – but when he'd realized that their packs disappeared as well – and then noticed that Aerith had taken to bringing shopping bags in with her… shopping bags that didn't come out (he kept watch)… well, a guy had to worry.

Could they _leave_ things in there? Was that even healthy?

Hell – he didn't even know how it was even physically possible. Just – one minute he'd been tuning out Barret as the other man ranted on about not trusting him – and the next the giant black man had simply walked into his chest.

_**Into his chest!!**_

How the hell?!

He's spent a good five minutes hyperventilating, groping the awfully solid and normal feeling thing he'd always assumed was his perfectly average chest, and randomly looking behind himself because it was easier to believe that a giant black man with a gun for an arm could walk _through _him than _into_ him.

It had almost been as freaky as watching the guy suddenly walk _out_ of his seemingly solid chest several minutes later on the elevator simply to harangue him. Needless to say, he hadn't had the friendliest responses.

And he still hadn't been prepared when the guy did it a second time. Or the third time. Or fourth.

How? The? Hell?

Perhaps the worse part though was that Barret acted like it was nothing unusual. Like it was _normal_ to walk in and out of other people's bodies on a regular basis. Since when?! Cloud had never seen it happen to anyone else. He sure as hell didn't remember doing that to anyone else himself and Barret was his first – and, damn it!, that sounded just about as weird as it probably should…

Point was - if it had freaked him out when Barret did it, he had taken it even worse when Barret and _Tifa_ disappeared into to him later! Because – he knew Tifa. He'd grown up next to Tifa. Tifa was about as normal and solid and _real_ to him as the ground under his feet or the sword in his hands. More so. She was… _Tifa_. A lot in his life might not make sense – but – this was Tifa. She was real. She _made _things make sense. So when she just walked into his chest after Barret and – disappeared – he almost passed out. Until the shock set in. Because – it was so abnormal, it had to be normal, right? Everyone was acting so calm about it – it had to be rational and he was the only one that just, somehow, had something weird going on inside him.

He was a little used to that feeling already. Shit! Maybe the voices in his head were people that had walked into his chest and had never come out and he'd forgotten they were in there!

After his mini-panic attack over that he'd done the only thing a guy could do. He'd shrugged and made do as best he could.

After a while, he'd gotten kind of used to people disappearing into his chest on a regular basis. It was still a little… weird. If he paid attention, for just a second, he could actually feel the press of them and his vision would go a little funny, like he was looking inward instead of outward. Needless to say, he didn't often make it a point to pay attention. Instead he just accepted it.

In a weird way, he came to like it. He'd realized it first with the girls but it had spread. Because… if they were inside his chest – then they couldn't get hurt. Or lost. He couldn't lose them if they were inside him. He could keep them safe and keep a proverbial 'eye' on them. Sure, they came out whenever a fight happened but… but he didn't have to worry about one of them getting in trouble because he wasn't nearby or getting separated from them.

He'd actually, after a bad fight a couple of times, wondered if he could just keep them safe inside him all the time. Except he seemed to have no control over when they came or went – even though he'd tried just for the hell of it… and because Cait Sith always made him feel weirdly bloated whenever that damned stuffed moogle rode around inside him.

As time went on though, he started to wonder what it was like for them. They never talked about it and he felt awkward about asking what his insides looked like. It seemed… rude somehow. Was it all guts and blood and muscle and hot and sticky and uncomfortable? Or was it like a little room with comfortable couches and an icebox for when they got hungry? Did they fall asleep when they went in or were they awake? And… if they were awake, were they aware of what was going on outside? He thought they probably were. They always knew when to come out to help with a fight and sometimes one of them would say something that indicated they knew what was going on when they were in there… (He was especially careful about how he responded when strange women hit on him when he had one of the girls inside him. It just seemed like the kind of thing he didn't want to risk. After all, what if they got mad and decided to _break_ something in there?)

It did make him feel awkward about going to the bathroom though and he still didn't know whether the girls or the guys made him more uncomfortable over that.

If he didn't look, could they not see as well, or did they have windows in there, or monitors or something that didn't need his eyes to see out of?

Somehow, hearing voices and sometimes not being sure about his past wasn't the largest problem he had anymore. Not by a long shot.

Like… did Nanaki shed in there? And, if he did, where did the hair go? Did it just lay around for the rest of his natural life, a fuzzy red coating over the entire inner space or did his body, slowly, slough it off? And if it did – how? He wasn't sneezing red hair out his nose or anything. And – what about the ash and smoke from Cid's constant cigarettes? It wasn't as if the guy put them out before he'd disappear in. So were there just clouds and clouds of constantly thickening smoke filling the place in his chest or did it leak out of his ears at night? And what about the dynamite the guy apparently carried in his jacket? Did he ever forget a stick or two and what happened if he did!?

He found he was starting to get picky about choosing Cid or Red for his team simply based on those questions.

Still, Tifa never smelled like smoke or dog/cat/critter whenever she came out… She was really good at keeping her living space clean too…

He was leery about taking Yuffie on his team too but that was because he was worried she'd steal something and what if it was his kidney or something equally important? Or worse – what if she got motion sick riding around inside him and puked?! How were you supposed to hose out something like that?

He didn't want Tifa to have to go in there with a mop and bucket.

He figured the worse Barret probably did in there was put his muddy boots on the furniture. Tifa probably cleaned up said mud and he kind of liked having her in there anyway so he didn't have to worry about her being out of his sight and getting hurt. Vincent probably read cryptic and depressing books of poetry and maybe pulled the curtains to block out the light. Aerith though…

Cloud, eyes narrowed, was starting to get suspicious about those shopping bags she kept bringing in with her.

Somehow it was all too easy for him to imagine Aerith redecorating his interior without telling him.

And she had this really, really, _really _strong penchant for pink things.

He wasn't sure it was polite not to include someone on your team just because you were worried about ending up with a pink interior though.

Besides… Aerith was kind of _pushy _about joining his team sometimes.

He was sitting there, worrying about it, in fact, late one evening in front of the Cosmo Candle, when Tifa came over and sat down next to him. She fidgeted for a minute and then asked:

"Cloud… can you carry something for me?"

He made a noise and held out his hand and she put a little carved figurine in it. In the firelight it was hard to tell but it looked like some kind of Nanaki type of creature carved out of sandstone and it was still warm from her hands. When he glanced back at her, she looked embarrassed to be caught buying such a frivolous trinket but he had just wanted to tell her it was nice.

She deserved to have nice things. Gaia knew she'd lost enough over the years. It seemed stupid to point it out to her though. He was sure she knew she deserved nice things. With a grunt, he turned to his own pack and fished out one of his shirts, carefully wrapping the little statue so that it wouldn't chip or break. She'd given it to him to take care of. It seemed very important that he didn't let it get damaged.

"It would be safer in your pack," he pointed out and she looked down and away, sparking his suspicions with her behavior.

"Oh, I – I don't have room. Any more room. To – to carry things."

He reached behind her and prodded the canvas bag on her back. It certainly felt full. Jammed full in fact and was that - ? He caught at the glint of fabric when she twisted to get the backpack out of range and the silk scarf slipped out of her pack in a long strand. She watched in horror as he slowly reeled it in around his fist.

A long, silk, transparent _pink_ scarf…

"That's mine! For my hair – " she tried to snatch it back and he used the opportunity to pop the buckle on her pack. More fabric spilled out.

Pink fabric.

_Lots_ of pink fabric.

Her cheeks flushed and she started gathering up the fabric with the sparkle of panic in her eyes.

"For a dress! I'm – making a dress. Out of – pretty curtains and things." She snatched the fuzzy pink throw pillow out of his hands.

There was really nothing for him to say in response to that. He simply kissed her. Strangely, after that, she didn't protest in the slightest when he threw all the pink home décor into the fire.

They never mentioned it again. But he never complained when she wanted him to carry something of hers in his pack. And, after that, he didn't worry about bringing Aerith along on his team anymore.

He just always made sure he brought Tifa too.


	34. Chapter 34: Facets

_an early Merry Christmas to my readers and a thank you for all the wonderful reviews and support all along the way for me. There's nothing like uplifting feed back to really get the gears moving for an author and I hope this gives back just a little bit of everything ya'll have given me. Merry Christmas and God bless in the new year to my gentle readers and best beloveds!_

**Facets**

by TamLin

1. **velvet **_(Sekihara Tae)_

After years of sensory deprivation, sanity shattering pain and stale, mute surroundings, the sudden sensation of Zack's hair against his cheek was almost too soft and _normal_ to bear.

2. **concupiscent** _(Sekihara Tae)_

It wasn't fair, he mused darkly, that after he'd missed out on most of his adolescence, all Tifa had to do was lean forward to get something from under the bar to have his riotous hormones deciding he was sixteen again.

3. **gyneolatry** _(Sekihara Tae)_

When he saw the man in Seventh Heaven for the sixth time in two weeks, Cloud mulled darkly, it wasn't that he minded if Reno seemed to love everything female, it was when he focused that adoration on a very specific one that it was time for him to go home.

4. **potent **_(Valentine'sNinja)_

He was a dangerous mix of little boy and pure, virile male, she thought in bemusement as he trudged through the bar and up the stairs, entirely unaware of the way every female eye in the place, hers included, followed him.

5. **wings** _(Valentine'sNinja)_

When the bridge broke and she fell, for the first time in his young life he realized with slowly ruined faith - some angels couldn't fly.

6. **misery** _(Valentine'sNinja)_

He thought he'd known pain before; nothing compared to the way it felt lying down to sleep each night in an empty ruin far from the warmth of his family that he'd come to anticipate at the end of each day.

7. **diaphanous** _(Fairheartstrife)_

Her heart shown brilliantly through her opal and garnet flecked eyes and the tears of joy in them when she whispered a single word to him: "Baby."

8. **syzygy** _(ObsessiveCompulsiveValkyrie)_

She thought Cloud and Barret were absolute opposites; until it came down to how far they were willing to go for what they believed in and the people they cared about.

9. **Momus** (or Momos) _(mom calling)_

She was supposed to be the kind, encouraging, motherly type that kept their strange traveling 'family' from tearing each other apart, so she fought very hard not to smile when he flippantly called Barret 'a bear wearing a marshmallow'.

10. **hippopoto-monstroses-quipedalian** _(Oreramar)_ _ps - ffnet apparently doesn't approve of your word and keeps erasing it when I save this document_

He had to turn his face to hide the smile threatening to leak through as he took in the children's faces after Tifa casually rattled off the spelling of the longest word she knew, hands behind her back, eyes closed like a school girl.

11. **dragon** _(Oreramar)_

When he came home after a particularly hard day, feeling gruff and scaly inside, Tifa just smiled and whispered that she'd learned the secret to defeating monsters like him from a goofy stage play at an amusement park years ago; he pretended to be disgruntled at her teasing and had secretly been glad when she hadn't stopped at just one – or just at his hand.

12. **mother** _(Oreramar)_  
When Marlene slipped up and called Tifa the name, he watched the light bloom across her face and contemplated how different the word sounded when it was spoken by a small girl with sunshine and smiles as opposed to a silver madman with dead eyes.

13. **amaranth **_(Oreramar)_

It wasn't the flower of legend that would never fade but, when he found it pressed between the pages of one of her books years later, its colors still held just as much hope and heart as they had the first time he'd given it to her in the slums.

14.** purr **_(vluna)_

Cloud was a man of few words but very vocal in his expressive noises: one of her favorites was the sound he made at the end of a hard day when she would find him almost asleep on his desk and firmly rub her fingers through his soft hair and over his scalp.

15. **panties **_(vluna)_

He recounted taking them all those years ago so that Barret would understand – _he_ had the prior claim to her.

16.** umbrella** _(punkiemonkie)_

Leaning into him, sheltered from the wind and cold and rain by his form, she decided she needed to forget her rain gear more often.

17.** loyal** _(peeka-chan)_

Everyone thought she was the faithful one of their couple but only she knew that _he_ came and found her just as many times as it went the other way when one of them had strayed.

18. **miss you** _(peeka-chan)(peeka can get away with a sneaky two words because she edited almost my entire TWT and frankly, I'd give her just about anything she asked for after that)_

She didn't say the words but each time she left a message on his phone… he heard them; he heard them because each time she left a message on his phone… he wanted to say them too.

19. **buried **_(peeka-chan)_

The only way to keep the memory of tender feelings safe from the nightmare world of gleaming silver scalpels, whispering, invasive voices and searing green was to lock it away so deeply that even he forgot about it.

20. **prestidigitator**_ (Sekihara Tae)_

Yuffie had no idea why, when, yet again, she was bragging about having 'magic fingers' that Tifa suddenly went bright red and looked everywhere but at the man next to her while Cloud just smirked down into his drink and refused to answer her demands for an explanation of what was so funny.

21. **redolent **_(Sekihara Tae)_

He would never tell her that, every other night, he switched their pillows just so he could bury his face in the one she'd used the night before.

22. **broken **_(fairheartstrife)_

Neither of them ever used Fire Materia and they never had to mention it to each other when the small stones were handed out before battle; the smell of burning flesh and the crackle of flame was too familiar and too often heard in dreams.

23.** voluptuous** _(fairheartstrife)_

He pitied the men that had only just realized she was beautiful; he'd know it over a decade ago, when she had still been twig arms and her curves were all just knees and elbows.

24. **ambrosia** _(fairheartstrife)_

She made the dessert of oranges and shredded coconut but he thought the flavor of the concoction was best when he stole a taste of it off of her finger and made her cheeks go pink.

25. **seraphic** _(fairheartstrife)_

As his mouth traveled down the curves of shoulder blades and the dip of arching spine, he was glad she didn't have the wings she should; they would only have gotten in the way.

26. **bodhisattva** _(mom calling)_

He never told her, but, as many years as they were together, every now and then he'd feel a twinge of guilt that she'd chosen to stay with him and live the awkward, strange, unpredictable life they did instead of choosing a man that could give her the world on a gold plate and make sure he was never late so she never had to worry.

27. **sortilege **_(Valentine'sNinja)_

Cloud so rarely lost his temper everyone was surprised when their leader calmly and silently threw Cait Sith out the door the first time after Meteor that the stuffed cat offered to read his fortune.

28. **caramel** _(Valentine'sNinja)_

It took three days to get the sticky brown substance entirely out of his hair and he suspected the only reason Tifa was too compassionate to laugh at him was because it had gotten there in the first place when it had fallen out of Marlene's mouth as they'd both fallen asleep on the couch together during a thunderstorm.

29.** zoo** _(Valentine'sNinja)_

It didn't start occurring until after the Cure but when Tifa caved on the first frog Denzel brought home it was the pebble that started the avalanche and from that point on, Cloud never knew what furred, scaled, fanged, clawed, slimy or feathered situation he was going to have to step over, around, or gently nudge through when he came home after being gone several days in a row.

30. **paternity** _(Valentine'sNinja)_

Matching DNA strands had nothing to do with it she mused as she watched Denzel give her the exact same quiet, vaguely reproachful, stubborn look from under his bangs that Cloud had when she told him it was time for a haircut.

31. **riddle **_(Iskra revoir and plushie family)_

Chin resting in her hand, elbow on the table, Tifa watched, bemused and proud and mystified, as Cloud, apparently effortlessly and without prior instruction, silently wove a cat's cradle with yarn for Marlene.

32. **miracle** _(Iskra revoir and plushie family)_

Despite everything he'd ever been through, the first time Cloud Strife really prayed was the day Tifa went into labor too early with their son.

33.** if **_(demonegg)_

When his word grew so filled with the 'what might be' and the 'what might have been' that he lost track of what was, she was always there to remind him that they needed milk for dinner and that he should leave his dirty clothes in the hamper because tomorrow was laundry day.

34. **fifteen**_(demonegg)_

As he grew older, his memories continued to settle but from time to time he would look over at the woman next to him and, for a moment, to him, she would still look like a fearless, innocent mountain guide holding his heart in her hands without even knowing it.

35. **cookie** _(demonegg)_

If you give a Cloud a cookie, he's gonna want some milk…


	35. Chapter 35: Love?

_I really don't know how to preface this one. Set during the Lifestream incident during the game.  
_

**Love?**

by TamLin

He wanted her to love him.

Sitting on top of the water tower with the sky of liquid green above and the empty landscape below… he wanted her to love him. Somewhere, on the edges of his thoughts, he knew he should be thinking of something else. Something Very Bad and something that, whenever his mind accidentally strayed close to it, immediately had him scuttling away. Something that was painful and something, he thought, that just might shatter him completely if he ever looked too close. So he thought about _her_ instead. Because, somehow, that train of thought was Important too. And he wanted her to love him.

He had wanted it for so long, with such a familiar ache that when the small voice finally asked:

_'why?'_

he almost ignored it.

Why did he need her to love him? What a stupid question. He needed her to love him because –

Because…

Because she was Tifa.

'But why was _Tifa's _love important?' that small part of him wouldn't leave the question alone and, trapped and alone on the tower, he had nothing to distract him from its voice.

Because… because she was **Tifa**. Wasn't that enough? But even as he thought it, his conscious twinged at him and he winced, rubbing absently at his thin child's chest.

What made Tifa's love so special…?

Well, he answered it, brows coming down in his pale face, she was Tifa. She was special. She was important. She was the most special, important thing in the entire village – which might as well be the entire world. If she, being special and important, decided that she loved him that would…

That would make him special and important.

Being loved by something, someone, so special, so important, so central – it would mean he was worth something. That he really was loveable. That… that someone so amazing would love him – that would mean there must be something pretty amazing about him too.

If Tifa decided she loved him, it would prove, to everyone else – to himself – that he was worth loving. That he was important. That he was someone pretty special too…

It was a good answer – no….

No.

It was a bad answer.

It was a horrible answer and sitting there in his child's body, his adult mind realized it.

It was a selfish answer and he felt suddenly depressed for it.

Really? He wanted her love just so that he could use it to prove he was worthwhile?

Thinking it made him wince and it made his stomach hurt.

Selfish men wanted women on their arm to show off, to brag about. To show the world how impressive they were, that they could have a woman like that interested in them. He didn't want Tifa just so he could brag about her! Did he?

Did he…?

Did he really just want her to love him so that he could prove to everyone else he was worth loving…?

That was a bad reason to want her love.

He couldn't be that shallow, could he? That childish?

No. No, he wanted her to love him because… because Tifa's love felt like hot oil in your joints and springs of steel in your bones. Because… because when she looked at him with those eyes of hers, he knew, he just knew – he could leap a building for her. He could take on the world. He could do anything – anything at all – that she asked him to.

Tifa's love drove the nightmares away…

That wasn't strong. That was needing her for weak reasons. He had always wanted to be her hero. Not… not to have her be his.

Except… she was. Because she was stronger than anyone he knew when she protected someone with her heart. She never gave up; she never gave in. She just… held on. Even when someone didn't deserve to be held on to anymore…

The way he didn't deserve to be held on to anymore.

But he could still hear her, searching for him. He could hear her _out there_. Calling his name.

She made him strong… but she also made him aware of how weak he really was. Because sometimes… sometimes he just wanted to hide in her arms.

Real men didn't feel that way. Real men never wanted to hide or needed comfort. Tifa needed a real man to love.

Why would he want her to love someone like him?

Except… he did.

He wanted her to love him.

He wanted her to love him because he loved her.

No. That was a stupid reason too. There were plenty of guys that loved, or thought they loved, Tifa. She couldn't – wouldn't – fall in love with every single one of them for that reason.

Even if he had loved her first and loved her longest.

Except… except he hadn't been very good at showing that he loved her.

He was never there for her when she needed him; he was too unsure about how he should act when he had wanted to show her. Part of him said to be suave… except he always felt stupid and fake when he was being suave.

He always felt like it wasn't enough.

Like it wasn't… right.

He wanted to be right for her.

He wanted to be everything she needed.

He wanted… he wanted to be able to show her that he loved her.

Because… because that was more important than being… loved by her…?

He wanted… he wanted her to love him. But – more than that – so much more than that he wanted to be able to love her.

He wanted to love her.

_He wanted to love her..._

It had to be the oldest thing he'd ever known and yet the sudden realization hit him as hard in the chest as Bahamut's bolt.

He wanted to love her.

He just – when it came down to it – he just wanted to love her.

Her – Tifa. The laughing little girl, the piano player, the motherless child, the bar maid with fists of steel and broken-hearted eyes. The scars and the beauty and the softness and the iron. The woman that always gave, the one that never asked, the one that worried more about whether he was all right than the fact she was in an ugly situation and he was in a dress. The one he'd worshiped as a child, cherished in his memories during adolescence and – and who had never left him through the entire confused, broken, hopeless situation since. He wanted…

Oh, Gaia… how he wanted to just be able to love her the way he'd always wanted to…

And maybe… maybe that was a good enough reason to want her love in return. Because… because, if she loved him, he would be able to love her the way she should be loved. Because… maybe… just maybe… if she loved him, he would be allowed to say the things and do the things for her that would show her how much he loved, had always loved, her. And it would be all right and it wouldn't make her uncomfortable or nervous and she might actually smile… for – for him… if she loved him and let him love her in return.

Even if he couldn't be suave and bold and noble… maybe, if she loved him, she'd understand what he meant when he tried to show her his love in all his stumbling, awkward, stilted ways.

If she loved him…

If she loved him – maybe - she'd forgive him for loving her in the first place.

Because – she deserved better than him. He was – something was broken. It felt newly broken when he prodded it delicately with his memory and yet, underneath that, it felt older still. As if something had been broken for a very, very long time…

He shied away from digging too deep to find out what that meant but the point remained. He was – very broken. Somehow. And Tifa deserved someone – very not broken.

Someone wonderful. Someone as amazing as she was.

And he… wasn't.

He was never going to be.

If he really loved her – shouldn't he want her to love someone else?

Except he didn't. Even in the child's body, his fists clenched and his teeth bared. No! No, he didn't want to give her up to anyone else.

He should…

If he really loved her, he would…

**He wouldn't!**

It… it didn't matter. He was stuck here and she was… there. Wherever_ there _was, out beyond the sick green.

Somewhere out there – where she called his name.

His name. Not someone else's. **_His_**.

She called his name.

Even after he'd failed her. Even after he'd been broken. Again. Even… even though he didn't deserve it.

She called for him.

That counted – didn't it? He stood up from his perch on the well and looked at the sickly sky above him. That counted. That she was calling him. He didn't know why she was calling or what she wanted but… but she was calling.

She was calling him.

And he loved her. And he thought – maybe – she loved him back. And it didn't matter if they didn't know exactly what that meant or how to make it work or how to show it – yet. Because they could figure it out. And however he'd gotten _here_ and she'd gotten _there_ – if she was calling him than it wasn't too far away.

It was never going to be too far away.

Thin brows came down in a small face and his soft fists clenched in determination.

Whatever was wrong, however he'd gotten here – he'd fix it. For her. Maybe… maybe _they'd_ fix it. And it might not fix right away or it might break again but he'd keep trying. Because…

Because he loved her.

And because – just maybe – she loved him too.

And it didn't matter why – it just mattered that it was.

Clutching the barrel of the well, he raised his face to the swirling sky above. And when he called her name it wasn't a child's voice that carried the sound up through the sticky green and into the darkness beyond.

Because – maybe – he needed her to love him for selfish reasons. But – maybe – he could love her for ones that weren't.


	36. Chapter 36: Avatar

_in a fit of absolute madness brought on by too many Japanese game shows on YouTube, James Cameron's latest movie and many, many references to World of Warcraft, I typed up this. demonegg was a bad influence and so I posted it to my LiveJournal account. Everyone there was an even WORSE influence and so I decided to post it here too just to prove I'm still alive if not entirely sane at the moment. Absolute crackfic but it's already spawned a second chapter over on LJ. If this keeps up, I may just move it out of the drabbles collection and make it a stand alone story. Just think of this as on-line gaming taken to the extreme._

**Avatar**

by TamLin

As psyched as she'd been about the game, there had been some serious trepidation the day the contest was scheduled to start. Sure, the producers could assure her all they wanted that the setting was absolutely authentic looking and that her personality had been chosen because it was the best match for the character she was supposed to be playing – but that wasn't the same as standing there in front of the transfer tubes realizing you were about to become the living embodiment of a fan revered and iconic fictional character. Fitting herself to the electronic nodes and interfaces to the on-line avatar didn't help her nerves any either. Sure it was one thing to run through the programs and tutorials on her own but the only other 'actor' she'd had any interaction with, in or out of the training sessions, was Bruce, otherwise known as Red XIII. She wouldn't be seeing him once they were sealed 'in game' for quite some time. So she'd been understandably nervous when she'd blinked open her eyes in the new body and new world the game designers had created.

After a few hours of running the bar, and having Biggs stare at her chest, though, she was starting to get into the feel of the game. The producers had told them all that the game wouldn't go exactly like the original video game of so many years ago but there were enough similarities to let her slip into her role. She still ran a bar called Seventh Heaven. It was still home to a rag tag band of terrorists intent on blowing things up and freeing the planet from the life draining mako reactors.

She still had a very short skirt and a very large… top. Though at least it was realistically large and not 'poke someone's eyes out with those things' large. Though if Biggs kept staring she might try to poke him in the eye.

The door to the bar swung open and Barret came in. He kept forgetting to answer to his character's name but he answered just fine when they yelled 'hey you!' at him. The thought made her smile to herself and she took Bigg's drink away from him. He protested – which meant he'd been paying attention to something other than her chest at least and it was enough to distract her from the man that walked through the door after Barrett.

Because, avatar or not, the Cloud Strife in this game simulation was dangerously attractive.

It didn't help that she'd had a crush on the fictional character when she was a kid… and maybe a little beyond childhood – either.

The mike hidden in her ear hissed a little and Macy's voice came over it. Or rather the sound of her voice because all her 'gamer' was doing was 'ooooh'ing.

Macy did that every time the blond hero walked into the room.

She thought, she hoped, that hearing it often enough meant that she didn't blush every time it happened anymore. According to the game's designers, the Cloud Strife avatar was 'souped up' compared to theirs. Better eyesight just seemed like it would go along with that deal.

Macy was one of her 'gamers'. Swift was the other. Each avatar in the game had three players. Her – who actually inhabited the body and was the main 'actor' and two 'gamers' who were actually sitting in a booth in the outside real world in front of monitors. Their job was to see things from a gamer's perspective and to guide, and guard, her as she went through the actual game itself. The game designers had found that the audience watching the game enjoyed having three people for each team, especially since they could real time intact via the internet with Macy or Swift – or any of the other 'gamers' for that matter. She liked her team and she liked both Macy and Swift. Especially since they were both much more knowledgeable about the semantics of the game than she was. They'd been introduced during training and they'd all fit nicely into each other's nuances.

Not, she suspected, the way Jessie's gamers did if the other woman's constant muttering indicated anything.

"Biggs," she tapped her fingers on the counter top to get his attention and then slowly drew it up to her face. "My eyes are up here," she repeated ("eleven" Swift was keeping count of the number of times she said it). "And you should probably head down to the hide out. You know how Barret is."

"That's right," the voice came from behind her and she jumped even as she shut her eyes and mentally cursed how quiet the designers had made a certain avatar when it walked. From the sound of Macy's snickers in her ear, the 'lapse' on their part had been intentional. One of Cloud's hands reached passed her to rest on the bar and it put his body in close, full, contact with hers. "He's got a hard-on because he's got the latest mission parameters and he just can't wait to share."

Barret was, in fact, bellowing at the rest of the team to get their 'sorry asses' down stairs and already cranking the lever that set the entrance to the room opening. It served to distract her for all of 3.5 seconds from the way it felt to have Cloud pressed up against her back. Biggs was glaring at the man behind her and Cloud made a noise in the back of his throat that somehow managed to sound both dismissive and aggressive at the same time. His other hand came around to spread, leather clad fingers wide, over her bare stomach and in her ear Macy squealed while she just tried not to shiver. Near the side of her head, Cloud's low voice rumbled:

"Sure, they look amazing. But they feel even better. Now piss off."

It took Biggs jaw-clenching and furious glare to have what Cloud had just implied sinking in and she was still blinking and processing it as the other man slid off his bar stool and stormed over to the entrance to the hidden room.

"Cloud!" she tried not to protest it too loudly and it came out between her teeth instead. All it earned her was the roll of a shoulder against her.

"What?" His voice sounded almost lazy and his head was turned away from her to watch the last of the team disappear down into the hidden room.

"We're not doing _that_!" Game or no, she had certain standards and it didn't matter how good looking a guy was, there was none of – _that _– going on within the first day. Not even in a fictional character's body. Something that might – might – have been a sound of amusement came near her ear.

"Then how is it supposed to be believable tomorrow morning when you ask me if I slept well and I answer 'next to you, who wouldn't'?"

She could actually feel the vibrations against her when he spoke in that low voice and she tried not to shiver again. She made a noise of her own and was about to tell him that there was no way she was asking him how he slept, tomorrow or ever for that matter, when he added in a quieter voice:

"Besides, maybe now he'll leave you alone."

It surprised her so much that she actually turned her head to look at him over her shoulder but he was looking very intently at something on the far door instead, brows down over his eyes with a slight frown. She looked too but didn't see anything that hadn't been there two minutes ago. As she looked away, he made another noise in his throat and his hand shifted from her stomach to her hip, holding her in place while he reached down under the bar and pulled out one of the glass sake bottles. The bottom of it caught the seam where her legs were pressed together and dragged upward along them. Her eyes went wide again and she caught his wrist in her fingers just as the glass hit the hem of her skirt. He chuckled but didn't lift it any more.

"Come on, Tifa," his voice was against her ear, low and coaxing. "Give me something hard."

"How about a brass knuckle sandwich?" she grit out between her teeth and his chuckle came again. His hand gave her hip a light squeeze and withdrew. He withdrew. But not before she thought she heard him say:

"That's my girl."

She watched him walk over to the trap door and drop down. In her ear she heard Macy state:

"I never knew Cloud was that…"

While she paused to search for a word, Tifa supplied:

"Sexually aggressive."

Macy let out a whistle.

"Hot."


	37. Chapter 37: A Turk and His SOLDIER

_So, quickly, while I've got a few days at home before hitting the not so dusty trail again - I suppose this is actually a continuation/prequel to 'In the Dark' way, way back in chapter 3 of this collection. Strangely, I think this should be read backward - chapter 3 first and then this one. Hey, if it works, right? on a by the by - anonymous - wow, your review really made my day and it was just what I needed. Thanks. And to all my gentle readers and best beloveds, happy Passover and Happy Easter! :D  
_

**A Turk and His SOLDIER**

by TamLin

He looked down at the object in his fingers and turned it, blue eyes narrowed.

Pretty soon the rest of his crew would arrive. There would be sound and motion and the usual last minute rushes to make sure everything was in order. They'd get updates over their phones, voices in the ear mikes, more people rushing around outside to clear the way for their exit…

But now, right now, in this moment, he was the only one there. The cockpit was silent, it's electronics still turned off, and the only sound he could hear passed the open door in the back was the rush of wind over rooftops and somewhere far away, muted voices drilling and ocean waves. If he inhaled, he could at least pretend he could smell salt water passed the oil and metal.

He bet she could.

The thought made him smile, just barely, to himself and he looked back down at the small sliver of silver in his leather covered hand.

How long had they been together?

First in childhood, growing up in Nibelheim. Those weren't memories he enjoyed looking back on and they hadn't been a part of each other's lives then. Or, she'd been part of his, always, always, the same way the sunshine or the mountain air had. He just hadn't been sure she'd known he existed as anything more than a town fixture. Especially after he'd let her fall…

He shook his head and closed his hand over the silver.

He'd made that up to her. He had. Even if she didn't seem to think it needed to be made up for or even understand – he'd fixed that. Or – there was no fixing the past – but at least he'd changed the way it had tried to set his – their – future.

At least, he was trying to.

He'd gone with her though. Snuck away from home to follow her onto the Shin-Ra bus. His mother had since forgiven him but all he'd known at the time was that, the night before when she'd confessed she was joining the corporation's program in a whisper on top of the well… her eyes had looked so large and lost and scared. And he'd know – right then – that he'd never let her go alone. Deep in his heart that night, he'd made her a promise.

To always be there for her. To always come when she needed him.

So he'd slipped onto the bus with the rest of the boys going to be regulation grunts and from the back he'd watched her with her brave smile and her cheerful goodbyes as she got on last.

He'd watched her all the way to Midgar.

When he wasn't busy puking his guts up.

The thought made him smirk and he reached out with his other hand to caress the stick of the helicopter. He hated traveling in enclosed spaces. The motion, the lack of fresh air, it made him sick to his stomach. But when he was the one piloting the beast… oh, that – that was a world of difference.

That was freedom. And he found that his soul craved that above almost everything.

Almost.

His thumb rubbed over the metal circle resting trustingly in his palm.

She'd joined the women's division, he'd joined the men's when they'd reached the City in the Sky. He hadn't gotten to see her much, not at first. He'd spent more time worrying about her than he had about himself and it had showed in his original scores. Even if the SOLDIER program accepted men, which it didn't, he knew he never would have made it. But she had.

It was why she had come to Midgar in the first place and he'd never once doubted her ability to become anything she wanted to. Hearing she had passed the first of the rigorous tests on the way to SOLDIER had made him more proud than if he'd done it himself – and it had also panicked him

Because he'd suddenly realized that she was going to be going out – out there – into the rest of the world and that the rest of the world was dangerous. He couldn't protect her, couldn't be there for her, as a Shin-Ra nobody grunt.

So he'd joined the Turks.

It hadn't been his first thought but he'd formed a friendship with one of them on a botched mission where FUBAR had applied to every aspect. They'd gotten along and Zack had complimented him on his ability to think on his feet. Zack was already a Turk at the time and just a few ranks away from achieving top recognition. Top recognition which, he'd cheerfully informed Cloud, would allow him to be permanently partnered with a SOLDIER, the eyes and ears and darker skills to her strength and reputation.

Zack was excited because it meant he was going to end up with some 'hot chick' and do 'real Turk work'. Cloud had heard the revelation as if it were a divine message to his previous failures, a light leading him forward through the darkness.

He'd done what it had taken, including cheating and calling in Zack's help, and he'd applied to join the Turks.

Later he found out that cheating and knowing the 'right people' was considered standard Turk operating procedure and had helped get him, as bumbling as those first attempts had been, short listed into the program. All he'd known for sure at the time was that when you were fighting, you fought in whatever way you needed to in order to make sure you won – and that he wasn't going to fail Tifa again. If being a Turk was what it took to stand by her side, than he'd be a Turk.

And all the darkness that came with it.

He looked back down at the ring in his palm and his eyes were dark and a little lost. The corporation and the Turks in particular were very, very good about having moral grounds for what they did. For glossing over things and keeping you from looking too closely at them. Your morals developed calluses fast. But… he still…

He still thought for himself. Despite the training and the indoctrination – and the simple fiercely loyal Turk camaraderie that made you want, very badly, not to. And – he was starting to get uncomfortable with the way he saw things heading deep inside the corporation.

Oh, he wasn't naïve. Not anymore. He knew that the corporation had never been blameless or clean. But… lately…

Maybe it was that he paid attention. He actually looked when he was involved in something. Tseng said it was one of the traits that made him so invaluable to the Turks. His ability to do something as simple as pay attention to details. He'd always paid attention to details. And the details he was seeing, in his head the way they were starting to fit together…

He frowned and closed his hand around the ring.

He wasn't sure he liked it and he hoped he was wrong and – and even if he wasn't how could he ever leave –

"Tifa." In his solitude, he could whisper her name and let the soft smile it brought to his lips out.

Recently promoted to SOLDIER 1st. His SOLDIER 1st. His partner, his responsibility, his shield mate. SOLDIER were always female – the mako had reacted badly with male testosterone in high levels and caused insanity. The first batch of male SOLDIER experiments had needed to be put down and that had been before Cloud's time at Shin-Ra. Since then, Shin-Ra had been on the lookout for female recruits. Tifa had scandalized the entire town when she'd volunteered but he'd understood. He'd wanted to be something more than a grocery store worker or a local innkeeper too. And – and that night at the well, she'd confessed that, if she was strong enough, maybe she could protect people like her mother from monsters that killed them and left their bodies strewn across flower filled meadows.

He understood that.

Needing to be strong enough to protect someone you loved…

He was. He had. In the year they'd been together, he'd saved her. Been able to be there for her.

Most of the time.

She called him her friend. Her partner. When she was exhausted, it was his shoulder she let her head drop onto. When she was happy, he was the one she turned her eyes to first. When she was upset… when she was upset, he was the only one she wanted to be around.

He paid attention to detail. He'd noticed.

It filled up the lonely place inside him that even the Turks, even Zack, couldn't fill. It made him look forward to missions when he could see her again, and downtime when she would be around to 'accidentally' run into. He was important to her. Even… he liked to pretend maybe he was even special out of all the SOLDIER and Turks that loved her. Opening his hand, he stared at the ring with its wolf head.

That was his symbol. Fenrir. Reno had said he was as clever as a wolf once and it had stuck.

Cloud didn't mind.

Tifa had liked it…

She'd even blushed prettily when Zack had laughed and called Cloud '_her_ wolf'.

Cloud didn't mind that either.

Turks already felt possessive about their specific SOLDIER. HQ knew better than to try to assign pairs that weren't already bonded. The one time they'd tried with Cloud, his 'replacement' had been found unconscious, shaved bald and tapped up in the broom closet and Cloud had already been on the outbound ship toward Wutai, hacking up half a lung from his flu and the other half from his motion sickness. He'd made it though and they hadn't tried a stunt like that since.

He'd heard that Genesis had done worse when they'd tried to sideline him thanks to a fractured ankle. Cissnei was still scolding him over that one.

It made Cloud smile to himself a little and then he exhaled as he lifted the ring.

Would Tifa wear it – if he gave it to her? Would she want to?

He made a noise and buried his face in his gloved hands, careful not to dislodge the ring.

Was he even going to have the nerve to offer it?

Probably not. He'd already had it for months now. She'd even spotted it once, travel arrangements often made for close quarters. He'd stammered out something absolutely idiotic and stuffed it hastily back in his suit pocket.

He might be a Turk but he was still such a loser. It was too bad the glasses and gloves didn't come with automatic suaveness.

Was 'suaveness' even a word?

Genesis would say it was.

Raising his eyes to peer over the safety of his hands, Cloud blinked at the windshield of the helicopter. He just –

He had a bad feeling about this mission.

A really, really bad feeling.

They'd been in tough situations and dangerous situations before. He'd had bad feelings about missions almost every time they went out. But this one…

This one was different.

This one was in home territory.

Nibelhiem.

A part of him had never wanted to see that town again and he knew that wasn't fair to his mother. He didn't have many good memories of the place and he already knew being a Turk wasn't going to change anyone's opinion of him there. He missed the mountains, the way the air tasted, the snows and the meadows full of grass and the stars that went on forever – but he didn't miss the town.

The best part of Nibelheim was already with him.

But the reactor there had been malfunctioning somehow and he and Tifa had been near Fort Condor, so the corporation had sent another team. Zack and his SOLDIER. The dark haired Turk had even called him on the PHS just to brag that he and Aerith were going to go see exactly what it was in Nibelheim that stunted growth spurts.

That had been a week ago.

With no contact since then and no contact with Nibelheim either.

SOLDIER and Turks sometimes dropped off the grid – but not for something as routine as a reactor check. Something was wrong and everyone knew it.

Which was why Cloud was sitting in the helicopter in Junon, waiting for his partner, his SOLDIER, his Tifa, to round up the rest of their party so they could leave. He'd seen the flicker of uncertainty in her eyes when she'd found out where they were going and he understood. She wasn't the village sweetheart that had left so many years ago. Perhaps neither of them really wanted to return.

But Zack and Aerith were there and they were in trouble badly enough that it had keep them from even contacting HQ. Whether they wanted to or not, whether he had a stomach clenching bad feeling or not – it was time for them both to go home.

From the corner of his eye, he caught movement and turned his head enough to spot his partner effortlessly leaping up onto the higher platform and trotting toward him. She saw his attention and waved with a smile that never failed to make him feel like the most important person in the world.

His hand clenched around the ring.

Should he - ?

Could he - ?

Later. With something close to panic he shoved the ring roughly back in his pocket and started the preflight prep. He'd give it to her later. Maybe after Nibelheim. After they'd laid the last of their ghosts to rest.

Yeah.

Yeah, he'd give it to her then.

It could wait.

Just for a little while longer… it could wait.


	38. Author's Note IV

…_this is an author's note…..it is only an author's note….since this is a real note these lines will be followed by important story information….I repeat….this is only an author's note…_

ohhh, best beloveds and gentle readers, do I have a surprise treat for you. The exceptionally talented SorrowsFlower has written a companion piece to chapter 8 of this collection. You remember 'First Steps'? Well, this is the Cloud POV of that story and it's going to knock your socks off.

So hurry over to her profile and check out 'Hero' - because it's awesomesauce to quote a friend. You won't regret it. And please, leave her some of that delicious feedback you guys always leave me in your reviews because we all know that it feeds our author's souls - and it never hurts to encourage Cloti writers to write more ;) She's got some kicktastic Cloti in her profile already for that matter.

extra bonus: her profile says she's looking for prompts... poor thing. I remember what ya'll did to me when I asked for words for my sentence collection. ;) Let slip the dogs of word -

_…we now return you to your regularly scheduled reading…thank you…_


	39. Chapter 39: Too Much

_I wrote this for a Final Fantasy VII 'kiss battle' over on Live Journal... and then forgot I'd written it. heh.... Luckily, someone was kind enough to come along and remind me with a review! So here it is - short, I know, but there's a limit on the number of characters you can fit into an LJ reply ;) Set during game time.  
_

**Too Much**

by TamLin

She gave too much.

She always did. Too much work, too much self-sacrifice, too much of herself. For all of them.

For him.

So when he didn't see her among the haphazard pile of their sleeping teammates, his gut nudged him to go hunt her down. Not that she wasn't perfectly capable of looking after herself, she just...

She just did that too much too.

He found her in the buggy and the sight made one edge of his tight mouth twitch. She'd obviously been in the process of trying to repack their gear to give them all more room - something that wasn't necessary, wasn't important, was thoughtful and caring and quietly nurturing...

But, just as exhausted as the rest of them, she'd fallen asleep, half draped over one of the seats. It looked uncomfortable and softly flexible the way only Tifa could ever be. It would make her ache when she woke up though and so he leaned in and gently extracted her. She murmured and sighed but didn't wake as he lifted her and carried her back to the others. Careful, as if she was breakable, he lowered her down into his own bedroll since she hadn't set hers up and tucked it around her. That, he decided, looked better. Brushing her hair back from her face, he leaned in and kissed her. It was supposed to be a 'thank you' kiss on her forehead, one she would never know about and he'd never admit to. It missed and hit her slightly parted lips instead.

Angry at himself, he stood up and moved away to take first watch.

She did too much. She gave too much.

He always took too much.


	40. Chapter 40: Forgiveness

_set just a little while after the closing of ACC. While I agree that Tifa is human and **should **struggle with forgiving Cloud for leaving, most people seem to forget one thing. I thought Tifa should be the one to point it out. this is also a bday fic that wasn't at all what I'd wanted to do for our very own demonegg. I wish I could have managed something fluffier or funnier._

**Forgiveness**

by TamLin

"I don't know how you put up with him sometimes."

Tifa looked over from where she was wiping the last counter clean and over at Yuffie – who was putting new water rings on the fresh wiped counter with her half finished drink. The young ninja was twirling the colorful straw she'd insisted belonged in a drink like that absently and had her cheek resting against her other hand. It was… a surprisingly contemplative look for the other girl and Tifa set aside her cleaning rag to walk over and rest her own elbows on the counter.

"Cloud's Cloud," she explained. The same way she explained it a hundred times and wouldn't mind doing a hundred more. The words might seem unhelpful but it was the way she said his name that filled in every blank and smoothed away every wrinkle of confusion. Yuffie tipped her head, bright little dark bird eyes watching her.

"Yeah," she said and it was strangely serious. "And you love him anyway."

They were alone in the empty bar and Tifa's lips lifted into a soft smile that made her eyes melting chocolate.

"Yes," she could finally admit out loud and it never seemed to grow old. "I love him."

Yuffie was peering intently at her and Tifa could all but see the gears grinding away in that sharp little mind of hers. Yuffie tipped her head again and her lips frowned. She fidgeted restlessly in her seat without lifting her cheek from her palm. More little circles of condensation got made. Tifa watched her curiously. Something was up with the young girl – young woman – Tifa mentally corrected herself.

"You're happy with him?" Yuffie's dark eyes peered up under the fringe of dark bangs and headband, almost nervous about the answer, but Tifa just nodded and made a humming sound.

"I'm happy with him."

"Even though he left you?"

The other girl said it almost carefully and tact coming from Yuffie really meant something. It was still an uncomfortable lance down through Tifa's heart. But it was a splinter that she acknowledged and had accepted and each day it got just a little bit smaller. Nothing lasted forever. Not pain… but… maybe joy did. She let her hands fall silently to the counter and wove her fingers together. Brows down, she nodded again.

"Even though he left me."

Left her because he was dying. Left her because he was hearing Sephiroth's voice in his head and the last time that had happened he'd almost killed and then beaten a flower girl that had followed him like a puppy and never offered him anything but smiles and teasing. Left because his ghosts had become more real than his life.

Left because, for Cloud, there was nothing more unforgivable than being useless to the people he'd decided to protect and care for.

But he'd still left. And she'd been alone. With two children and one of them dying and all three of them waiting, like the pause between breathes, for him to come back and make them all whole again.

"Hey, Teef?"

Yuffie's voice pulled her back from the memories and she looked at the younger girl to find concern in those dark eyes. She offered a small smile.

"It's okay, Yuffie." She relaxed her fingers to reach out and take the other girls' hand. "I'm not going to fall apart. Cloud's back with us now and he's staying."

There was, perhaps, just the hint of a hard edged determination in that last sentence… but it was all right. Sometimes, she thought she saw it in Cloud's eyes when one of his deliveries called to ask him to take longer than usual to be gone from home. They weren't perfect. Not even close. But they were young and they were still learning. They'd make it. Tifa believed it deep down where her soul lived and that's why the splinter that was only slowly fading out of her heart wasn't as sharp as it should have been and didn't hurt quite so often.

"I know!" Yuffie was quick to agree and it made the edges of Tifa's lips curl. Yuffie saw it and felt the need to elaborate. "You guys kick ass. And – you'd kick Cloud's ass if he tried to leave again. And he knows it. And then he'd have to get in line so we could all kick his ass as well." Her eyes narrowed. "He's so stubborn."

It pulled the quiet laugh out of Tifa and she let go of Yuffie's hands to automatically pick up the towel to wipe away the swirling trail of water. Whether it was subconscious or not, Yuffie's hand immediately moved to make more with the untouched drink. Tifa chased it absently across the bar top for a minute until Yuffie finally stopped and with those serious eyes, peered at her again. Yuffie always peered when she was measuring or trying to figure something out.

"But – how do you forgive him? For… hurting you? How do you make it okay when you look at him so that it doesn't feel like little weasels have your heart and they're gnawing on it with their tiny little teeth?"

It sounded as if Yuffie wasn't asking it in a purely theoretical way and Tifa looked at her a bit closer. Who was Yuffie trying to forgive? Who'd hurt her so badly she didn't forgive it automatically? The little ninja was a bundle of energy… but she had feelings just as much as any of them and they ran just as deep. Tifa wound her fingers in the bar rag and exhaled. For a long moment she was silent and it was a show of just how much Yuffie really cared about the answer that she didn't interrupt or even fidget. If Yuffie was expecting Tifa to be the perfect example and sure shot answer… Tifa felt a little bad. She wasn't a very good role model to follow. But she'd try.

"I think – " she started and then shut her mouth for a minute more, brows over her eyes. "I think it's easier to forgive because he's always forgiven me. Or – " she paused again. "He's never held it against me in the first place."

Yuffie snorted and rolled her eyes.

"Teef," she drew the name out. "You're – Tifa," she said it as if it were an explanation all by itself. "Chocobo Head doesn't have anything to forgive. What'd you do? Spit in his juice for breakfast one morning? Use the last of his shampoo? Oh!" Her grin went bright. "You put a smudge on Fenrir with your 'grubby little fingers', didn't you?"

The younger girl took a strange delight out of the time Cloud had half-admonished, half grunted at her with those words about his precious bike. Tifa chuckled but then the smile faded a little and she shook her head.

"No. He's got plenty he could hold against me if he wanted to."

Yuffie wasn't buying it, obviously believing Tifa was just trying to make the judgment on Cloud a bit lighter by pretending she deserved some of it too. But Tifa swallowed and her smile faded.

What did Cloud have to forgive her for?

How about a childhood in which she never reached out to him? A childhood in which she was so caught up in herself and her young, little world that she noticed – but never did anything but notice - the little blond boy with the sad eyes always right on the edge of her life. Children were cruel – and careless. Tifa had always hoped she wasn't the first to him – he certainly didn't remember anything – but she had been careless and she would do almost anything in her power now to go back to then and tell her younger self to look beyond her own problems and notice someone else's.

How about a fall that had been only her own stubbornness and stupidity but that had sealed his fate as an outcast and a loner in their village? How about never noticing how the village had changed toward him after her recovery? Never asking or wondering about the whole story of what had happened to her in the mountains. How about letting him bear blame that had been entirely hers all of his childhood?

How about a promise that meant too much to either of them to let go – but that was a constant wound waiting to happen and buried so deep inside Cloud it was never coming out? An impossible request – that he took seriously and flogged himself over missing the impossible mark on. No one could be everywhere at once. Bad things happened. It wasn't his fault. But that promise, that treasured, loved, protected, binding promise they both held to – Tifa knew it wasn't healthy for him. And yet neither of them would let what had been a little girl's impossible whim and innate desire to have something to draw the little blond boy back to her one day, go.

"I didn't tell him," she settled on and her voice was soft in the dim lighting of the bar. Yuffie looked at her, a Marlene curious look, and Tifa's lips shifted rueful and tilted at their edges in a bitter smile. She met those curious eyes.

"I found him in the train station in the Midgar slums. He was sick and dressed as a SOLDIER and I took him back to the bar and got Barret to hire him to join AVALANCHE."

Yuffie nodded. Everyone knew that story. Tifa nodded back.

"He thought he was SOLDIER First Class and it wasn't until the Northern Crater that we found out he wasn't."

"I know," Yuffie had been there for some of it and she'd heard the rest over and over again. It was a familiar tale. Tifa met her eyes.

"Yuffie… I knew. I knew all along he wasn't a SOLDIER. I knew he wasn't telling the truth. I knew something was wrong. And I didn't say anything."

That was a part of the story they didn't tell, because Tifa never talked about it and only Cloud knew for sure. And Cloud… he never talked about those times at all. Tifa's shoulders settled as she leaned forward on the counter top.

"I knew something was wrong and I didn't tell him. I didn't tell him he was remembering things that hadn't happened. I didn't tell him that his stories weren't real. I knew – and I didn't tell him."

"Teef – " Yuffie tried to interrupt but Tifa raised her hand. Yuffie needed to understand – because no one seemed to realize what she was saying.

"Yuffie, even when he asked me, I avoided answering him. I knew he was saying he was one person – and I knew he wasn't. It confused me. It scared me. And it made me doubt my own memories. But, all along, I knew. And when Sephiroth finally confronted him about it – right in front of me – I was no help to him at all. He relied on me, Yuffie. He relied on me to tell him what was real and what wasn't, to tell him who he was – and I didn't. I was a coward. I knew he was counting on me – and I hide from it instead of being what he needed me to be. And it almost killed him. It shattered his soul and his heart and I've always wondered if, deep down, it might not have shattered him so hard if it hadn't been my betrayal of his trust that had led to it. Cloud almost lost himself – and it was my fault."

"But – it was Sephiroth messing with his head! It was Sephiroth's fault!" Yuffie protested, eyes wide and Tifa shook her head. Not about to let her responsibility slip this time or try to foist the blame off on some boogieman.

"Sephiroth isn't the one that Cloud counted on. I was. And I'm the one that was too scared to tell him the truth."

Sometimes… she was still too scared to tell him the truth. But she was getting better. Gaia – she prayed she was getting better.

"He was walking along the edge of a cliff and I knew it – and I never told him he was in danger of falling. I thought that if I stayed close enough, if he started to slip, I could catch him – but he did – and I didn't. He might have fallen anyway – but it's my fault I didn't even warn him." She met Yuffie's eyes.

"Do you understand what I'm telling you? Yes. He left me and the children. It hurt. It was wrong. But long before that I betrayed his trust in me and let his soul be shattered under Sephiroth's heel. Cloud's not faultless. But neither am I. How could I ever withhold myself or my love or my forgiveness from him when he's so desperate for it when he doesn't even acknowledge how terribly I failed him?"

Yuffie's lips were parted, as if she was going to protest and defend Tifa from her own accusations. But nothing came out. Finally, the younger girl shook her head and frowned.

"Nobody ever told me that part."

One edge of Tifa's lips crooked.

"Most people don't know it and the ones that do don't seem to realize it. Cloud hasn't forgiven me for it. He acts as if it was the only sensible thing I could have done and doesn't even seem to think it was wrong of me. I honestly don't know if I would do things differently even now. But I do know what I cost him and I do know how it hurt him. And I know that he has never once blamed me for any of the things I have, carelessly or not so carelessly, done with his soul. Everyone likes to blame Cloud for leaving and pretend I'm this perfect, long-suffering goddess for taking him back. He doesn't care if they think that way about him. He thinks he deserves it. But he doesn't. Does it hurt that he left? Of course. But he's never held mistakes I've made thinking they were 'for his good' against me. I'm not as generous as he is – but I'm going to make myself that way. Because he deserves it. Because it's only fair. Because I love him and that's what you do when you love someone. I learned that from him. Even if he wouldn't believe me if I told him so."

It was quiet for a long time and Tifa plucked the watered down drink out of Yuffie's hands and rinsed it out in the sink. When she came back to wipe off the counter, Yuffie was looking at her thoughtfully.

"That's pretty wow."

Tifa made an amused noise and smiled.

"Tell me about it," she agreed. Yuffie's smile started and spread like the rising sun.

"You two are pretty wow together."

It made Tifa break into a grin even as her cheeks dusted with color, still getting used to the concept of 'together' but liking the sound of it. Outside in the night, the familiar growl of a bike approached and then slowed and died out. A few moments later, the door to the small garage opened and a dusty, tired looking Cloud trudged through the narrow door. The stairs to the rest of the house were right there but he turned from habit to search the bar first. Almost invisible his lips relaxed and, just possibly, curved a little as he shifted his path and came in behind the counter. Tifa was soon rewarded by the comforting weight of him as he wrapped his arms around her from behind and leaned forward into her, both sheltering and seeking comfort after a long, hard day. She didn't care that he was dusty and sweaty.

Cloud was Cloud.

His chin rubbed against her shoulder, as physically affectionate as he was willing to get in front of curious ninja eyes and then he raised his own eyes, tropic sea blue, to look at their guest. He didn't give Tifa words – but he'd never needed to. Words had never been their best way of communicating and she thought she preferred it that way.

"Yuffie." He acknowledged their tiny visitor and she gave him a cheeky grin.

"You know," their resident ninja told him. "You're pretty okay. For a Cloud."


	41. Chapter 41: It's a Promise

_time to answer the deep and burning question everyone's been asking since the release of Advent Children._

It's A Promise

by TamLin

Her hands were shaking.

She sat on the edge of the tub with the scissors and tried to make them stop shaking. They shouldn't even be shaking. She'd fought monsters, saved the world, killed a demon, lost an angel... her hands shouldn't start shaking now. Over this of all things.

But they are and she presses her lips together and tries to make them stop.

It shouldn't be so hard. This is about new beginnings. If Midgar can have a new beginning out of it's destruction... shouldn't she be allowed to as well? Her old life is over. She's not Tifa Lockhart, AVALANCHE member, planet savior, wanted terrorist, monster fighter. She's Tifa Lockhart, bar owner, adopted mother, family provider, quiet citizen of a new world. She's already left behind the battle gloves and the steel toed shoes. There's no place for them in painting new walls or ordering glasses. No place for long, arm protecting sheaths or the metal elbow guard against running children and sweeping floors of concrete dust and the mud of a new city. She's working on a leather apron to go over the shorts she wears now because it's easier to chase a little girl and an absent minded young man in shorts than in a short skirt. Even the half top might go as the suspenders and belt already are because she's thinking of a leather vest of some sort to make any food or liquid spills she gets on her easier to clean...

She's a long way from blood and the mud of half of Gaia and the sweat of a long fight and the ache of knuckles joints.

Even the materia's been put away. It's part of Gaia, mako energy and it just seems... wrong to use it in this new world that's struggling so hard to leave mako behind and move forward to safer, kinder means of living. Cloud has most of it, Yuffie - despite herself has some of it. Tifa keeps a few mastered pieces in safe places around the bar and the home. Important pieces like the Phoenix and several Restores as well as a Time and, because she'll never feel entirely safe, Lightning. But she doesn't wear them anymore.

She's leaving all of that behind.

It's part of living, like Barret says. It's moving forward to put some hope against all that despair she caused.

Cloud's doing it.

He's got those little side trips he's making that he's just told her about. It's mostly favors now but he's already letting her talk him into making it a business. She knows he needs to feel useful and she knows he'll never feel as if he belongs here if he's not contributing gil. She knows, despite not always liking it, that he needs to be out in big, empty places to settle himself sometimes and she knows that he needs to protect and sometimes that means killing random monsters. She knows he's uncomfortable interacting with strangers sometimes now, though Gaia knows he did it enough when they were traveling, but the point is - Cloud's moving forward too. He's struggling to leave his past behind and step into the future.

Their future.

Because that's what he calls it. He says 'together' and she says 'family' and they both know that they mean the same thing. Most days...

She's stalling and she knows it. Locking her jaw she lifts the scissor again - and closes her eyes. She hears the snick of the blade and when she opens her eyes... there a long dark strand of hair on the bathroom floor. She has a moment to stare at the living contrast - and then it all goes blurry as her eyes fill up with tears.

Stupid. It's just a hair cut. She'd promised - !

Running the back of her scissor free hand over her eyes, she tries to push away the tears. This isn't someone dying. It's not the end of the world. It's just a stupid, stupid desperate hair cut. It shouldn't be a big deal. She wants to do this - she really does. It's a part of moving forward and getting on with her life.

So why does she feel like wailing like a little girl and hiding in her room?

"Tifa...?"

She looks up in horror to see a watery shape standing in the doorway but she knows it's Cloud before she even blinks the tears away. He's not supposed to see her like this. Everyone's supposed to be gone.

Doesn't he knock?

But no, Cloud never knocks... but she also didn't lock the door and he thinks no one's supposed to be home. For a very long time they both stare at each other, frozen where they are and then his eyes finally leave hers to take in the scissors... and the lock of dark hair near her feet.

She feels embarrassed. And guilty. As if he's caught her doing something bad she's not supposed to and she watches him meekly as his eyes finally rise to find hers again. The question comes out soft and softly without inflection as he finally calmly asks:

"Tifa... why are you cutting your hair?"

"I promised," it comes out louder than she'd meant it to and more choked than she'd wanted and she turns her head away to scrub at her eyes again. He stands in the doorway, hesitant and caught between leaving and staying. She doesn't blame him. She doesn't get emotional like this often and especially not over something as stupid as cutting off her hair. Miserable, she hunches her shoulders and looks away, waiting for him to leave so she can finish. He's not supposed to see her this way and she's supposed to already have this done and dealt with before everyone comes home.

It's a long stretching minute. Finally, without looking at him, she gives in.

"I promised I'd cut my hair," its a whisper and she suddenly realizes how silly it all sounds. She stops - but he stays where he is and finally she bows her head and says: "After Nibelheim. I - promised myself that I wouldn't cut my hair until - " her voice fades off, "Until I'd made the people that did that pay."

It sounded so over-dramatic now - and it was. It was a fifteen year old girl's need for revenge and a hatred that she'd had to fuel to keep herself alive when she really had no reason to not join the rest of her village, her world, and simply give up and die too. She'd changed since then. Not much. Not in any noble way. But enough that the long hair, now that both ShinRa and Sephiroth were gone, reminded her of who she had been and the life she'd lived and the one she wanted to leave behind. She looks up at Cloud and opens her mouth to explain - except he already is.

"It's not who you are anymore." His voice is quiet and she waits for him to say more, but he doesn't. He simply steps into the bathroom too, boots solid on the tile and gently takes the scissors from her. The waste basket makes a soft noise as he pulls it over as well and he takes her long hair in his gloved hands. For a long time, they both freeze there... and then he bends his head and she feels the pressure of the scissors.

It feels slow but he never stops, never lets go, never looks away from what he's doing. She feels the weight when the hair comes free, slowly growing lighter and she doesn't look when the scissors finally stop and he leans down to set the long, broken coil of her hair in the waste basket. He sets the scissors back in her limp hands where they rest in her lap, blade pointed away from her.

And then he gently smooths his hand over her hair in one long stroke. Very softly, he whispers:

"I like it."

Shooting him a surprised look she sees the look in his eyes and he's a little boy, full of wonder and contentment. He catches her look and the smile he gives her is shy. Then he scoops up the waste basket and, fitting it under his arm, he goes back out the door.

Worried, hesitant, Tifa lifts her hand and smooths it down the same path his had taken. Slow, her lips start to curve at their very edges. It feels...

It feels like a new promise.


	42. Chapter 42: Be My Shelter

_for punkiemonkie who asked for a 'umbrella/raining/romance idea. Well... someone forgot their umbrella. I hope you like it anyway and I hope all my best beloveds and gentle readers had a great thanksgiving day whether they celebrate it or not ;)_

Be My Shelter

by TamLin

Tifa stood in the doorway and watched the rain come down. It wasn't a heavy rain but it was the dull, dreary gray rain that she knew from experience would be cold and soak under her clothes and generally do it's best to make her miserable as long after she was out of it as it could. She gave a quiet sigh and tried to steel herself for it, stalling by trying to decide if it was worth running through or if it wasn't even worth that.

It was her own fault really. She was trained enough, had lived here long enough, that she had recognized the signs when she'd left her house. She hadn't brought her raingear though because she's just meant to be gone a few minutes. A few minutes had turned into a few minutes more however as she'd got caught listening to Mr. Green recite his usual litany of aches brought on by the threatening weather as she'd paid for her groceries. And now she was standing in the doorway of the shop, watching the rain come down, cradling her sack of groceries against her chest and pretending the weather was going to clear any minute now.

Any minute now…

Any minute…

Any – oh, who was she kidding? With a quiet sigh and an overdramatic slump of her shoulders to make fun of her own reluctance and make her feel better, she gave in. Time to brace up. It wasn't that far to her own house and then she could dry off and change into clean clothes and wait for the chill to leave her bones.

It wasn't monsters or breaking bridges after all.

Behind her boots scuffed on the wooden floor and she jumped a little in surprise, turning wide eyes to look over her shoulder, startled at how close the sound was. And then her eyes widened just a little bit more.

It was the soldier from before. The one who had saved her from the summoned monster at the reactor and gotten hurt. Zack had told her he was okay – but she hadn't seen him in the three days since she'd helped him back down the mountain.

She'd thought he was avoiding her.

She hadn't exactly been the most helpful when the summon had attacked, so surprised that she'd frozen momentarily and he'd had to get in the way to save her from it's attack. He'd gotten hurt because of her. She'd wanted to apologize –

Except now that he was in front of her, everything she'd wanted to say just dried up and she couldn't think of anything at all. What squeaked out was a pathetic little:

"…hi."

She couldn't see much more than his chin because his helmet was in the way but that pale skin ducked just a little bit more and she had the distinct impression he was peering up at her through his bangs. His shoulders were hunched just a little bit forward and his hands hung in loose fists at his sides. Finally he gave what was close to a nod. Against the canvas bag she was holding, Tifa's own fingers clenched and unclenched.

She wasn't sure why she felt suddenly so shy. She had no problem with Zack and he was a big, bad SOLDIER. Something about the soldier in front of her though made her feel – strange. Kind of soft and shy and super aware of the fact rain made her hair a bit frizzy and the fact she was just wearing her kick around clothes instead of her nice outfit. Awkward, she shifted a little on her feet.

The soldier rubbed the back of his neck and looked at his boots.

"I – um – I wanted to thank you. F-for saving me on the mountain?" she stumbled over it and it wasn't at all what she'd pictured herself saying – or how she'd pictured herself saying it – when she'd been going over it in her head at night before she fell asleep. His face turned to the side away from her and she heard the creak of leather as his hands fisted in their gloves. Stupid. She was doing this so stupidly. Not at all as smooth and beautiful as she'd envisioned. As much as she'd wanted to see him, now all she could think about was getting away so she could mentally berate herself in private.

"So – thanks," she nodded several times and then shrugged so that the bag in her arms lifted. "I've – ah – I've got to get home now though. Um, dinner and all. You know?"

Mentally wishing she could scrub her hands over her face at how badly she was handling this, she gave him what she hoped was a convincing smile. Why was she having such a hard time? She never had a hard time talking to people. Except here she was, stumbling over her words and worrying about her hair and wishing –

…wishing he was blond. Because then everything would make sense.

"Got to go," it was all the warning she could managed and then she ducked out into the rain as quickly as she could, clearing the two stairs down to the ground and then shutting her eyes to cringe. Stupid, stupid, stupid.

And then the rain let up.

Her head jerked up and she blinked drops off of her lashes. The worn leather of a brown glove brushed water from her cheeks almost reverently. She was surprised when it didn't startle her. She wasn't used to being touched. Looking up, she saw one of the empty burlap feed sacks Mr. Green kept near the door was being held over her head to keep the rain off and the soldier from the store was holding it awkwardly in place that way across his arm while he peered at her under it's shelter.

It was so – incongruous and awkward and sweet that she had to rapidly blink a few more times against the tightness in her throat and there was nothing in the world that could have stopped the shy, blushing smile she gave him. Under the shelter of his helmet, his own lips offered back something just as embarrassed and shy.

"Like a mama chocobo," she said before she could realize how it sounded and stop herself but the sack was draped across his arm and he had raised it to hold it over her head like a wing. Where she could see the hint of them, his cheeks went red – but then his lips twitched again and he gave a quiet cough she somehow knew wasn't a cough. It reassured her, made her feel safe and comfortable and so she shyly scooted a little closer to him with the silent excuse of making it easier for him to keep the fabric over her head. His chin tucked closer to her and she offered another shy smile.

"Thank you," she whispered and this time he hummed a low, soft sound deep in his throat that made all the tightness in her chest relax but made all the muscles in her stomach tense oddly.

"You're getting wet too," she murmured, realizing it with a flare of guilt for not thinking of it sooner but he only grunted and shook his head a little, reaching up to tap knuckles against the metal of his helmet. It jarred the cloth over her a little and he was meticulous in rearranging it to make sure she stayed dry. She stood carefully still so she wouldn't disturb him as he did.

He still smelled nice. Like leather and detergent and that quieter clean mountain air smell she thought was just him. This close to her, he was warm too and that was nice against the chill of the rain too. His hand shifted in front of her, bringing her attention back to the present with a questioning gesture and her cheeks heated. He was right though, the burlap wouldn't hold out the rain forever and they really did need to get her home.

She started forward but she already knew that the second they started moving it was all going to fall apart. There was no way they could match steps close enough in the awkward position they were in and her little shelter wouldn't last. It was all right though. She didn't really care about the rain anymore.

Except they didn't jar apart. Somehow his steps matched hers almost as if he knew the way she walked and the sack stayed raised for her, warding off the wet and the damp. He was even standing in the path of the wind, body blocking hers from any gusts of rain and she had no idea whether it was on purpose or just chance. Her heart liked to think it was on purpose even if she felt bad for him taking the rain instead of her. Rain off of Mount Nibel wasn't something you ever got used to but at least she was from here and had toughened to it a little. He had no such luck but she noticed that he didn't give any indication of being bothered by it and his steps stayed even and steady with hers, in no hurry to get in out of the storm.

She wasn't exactly either and felt disappointed when he finally stopped walking and she did automatically next to him to realize that they were in front of her front door. She peered up at him from under the cover of his shelter and found he was already looking down at her, chin tucked a little, shoulders less bowed forward than they had been before. She gave him another smile, wishing she lived further away so they could have walked longer – even if it was selfish of her. Searching the shadows under the rim of the helmet, she asked:

"Would you like to come in? You're wet and I can get you something warm to drink to help."

He shifted in answer, for a second leaning almost closer and then he was straightening and shaking his head, exhaling silently through his lips.

She caught herself doing the same thing.

Somehow – she wasn't surprised that he wouldn't come in but it still didn't stop the disappointment. She ducked her own head, determined not to spoil things now though just because of that. So she nodded and looked back up at him with a smile that was just for him.

"It's okay," she assured him. And was then brave enough to add: "Maybe next time."

The hope hung in the air between them, back patterned by the quiet hush of falling rain. His lips parted and then pressed shut. Parted again. Shut again. Finally she saw him swallow and nod weakly.

It flushed her system with light as bright as summer sunshine and the smile she beamed back at him held it all.

"Okay." She nodded. Still riding that wave of joy, she ducked her head forward quickly before she could lose her nerve and pecked a quick kiss on his cheek.

"Thank you for saving me. Again."

Cheeks flushed, listening to him make a choking noise as his pale skin flared red, she opened her door and darted inside, shutting it quickly afterward. She still scooted quickly over to the side though so that she could peer out the window, hidden by the curtain and watch as it took the soldier a very long time and several rubs to the back of his neck before he finally turned and walked away. Smiling to herself, she thought, maybe, he was walking just a bit straighter too. Then she sank back against the wall and let herself slide down it, still hugging her bag of groceries to her chest.

She didn't know exactly what had happened but she knew it was good. Her heart told her so. Determined, she finally got back to her feet. Now she just had to make sure that she didn't mess anything up.

Except she never got the chance. That night Nibelheim burned and her world of childhood dreams and hopes turned to ash along with it.

It was many years later and rain from an entirely different continent that had Tifa standing in the doorway of a different shop and staring out at the gray drizzle. Her black and white sneakers made squeaking sounds against the concrete floor as she fidgeted in the doorway.

Home wasn't that far away and she had to get dinner started soon. Marlene would be waiting. It was just a little bit of wet and even if the rain that fell on Edge always smelled a bit funny and was a bit dirty, at least it wasn't cold most of the time. Wearing her work leathers the way she was, she wouldn't even get that wet. It was just –

She was so tired of the rain and gray skies. It had been raining for almost two weeks and when it didn't rain it was just – blah. Everything in Edge was blah and sometimes she didn't blame Cloud in the least for being gone away from it so long on his deliveries. It was as if the recent disease that was starting to inflict itself had taken over not only the humans but now even the sky, spreading its bruised gray across the entire world. Tifa was feeling tired and worn down and lonely and she knew that the rain was nothing to let bother her, it was just –

She was tired of being – dreary.

What a stupid thing to be letting herself feel.

Still, she hesitated in the doorway.

And as if in answer to a silent call she'd never made, she watched a dark figure materialize out of the dim alleyway and trudge with slow, steady steps toward her. He had a scarf of thick wool that he sometimes wore when it got truly cold around his shoulders and pulled up to shelter his head but even without the tell-tale golden spikes visible there was no mistaking Cloud Strife.

She would have known him even without the giant sword in it's harness against his back though.

His steps didn't falter or hesitate until he came to a stop directly in front of her at the foot of the low stairs that kept the worse of the mud out of the shop. Silent he raised his face when she murmured his name and his blue eyes were tired but still bright as they locked on her under the shadow of his hood.

"You weren't home."

His voice came out throaty and raw and quiet, coarse as if he hasn't used it lately. He cleared his throat in the rain and tried again.

"I got home and you weren't there. Marlene said you'd come here."

He stopped abruptly as if he'd run out of words with still more left to say and simply looked up at her with his eyes of tropic blue, looking a little lost and very determined.

He was here to bring her home. Where she belonged.

It made something in her throat tighten and she had to blink several times against it but the edges of her lips trembled upward for him and whatever he saw it convinced him to take those two steps up to join her in the doorway, dripping puddles of water carelessly into the interior of the store. He didn't notice and who was going to chide Cloud Strife, savior of Gaia for being a bit messy? Without a word, he unwound his scarf and then draped it around her, taking his time, brows down in concentration as he meticulously rearranged its folds around her and then pulled the thick part of it up to form a protective hood for her, sheltering her shoulders and head from the drizzling rain. Careful, worn leather of his gloves raising unintentional goose bumps across her skin, he made sure that her hair was tucked up into it as well, frowning a little at himself as he worked.

She stood very still so that she didn't interrupt him and watched his face as he did.

Finally he was satisfied she was as protected against the harmless water as she possibly could be and he wordlessly took her bags from her arms, shifting their weight so they both sat in the cradle of one of his arms. His other hand shifted and he looked suddenly lost with what to do with its freedom.

With a soft smile, Tifa slipped her fingers between his there and felt him relax. Together they stepped out into the rain, steps matched and made their way home down the narrow street and reworked alleys. Fenrir was parked outside the back door to Seventh Heaven under the awning they'd put up for it until they could build a garage and it ticked in the cool air, still in the process of cooling down. Cloud dropped her hand so that Tifa could go up the low steps first. She pushed the door open but Cloud paused at the bottom of the steps. She turned in the doorway and he was looking up at her again, blond hair dark with moisture, pale, tired face still smudged with some of the more stubborn stains from his traveling to get here, forgotten groceries still in his possession.

Waiting.

He'd been gone a very long time this trip.

With a smile, Tifa's face softened and she stepped back into the house just one step, just enough to make room for him.

"You're wet," she told him softly. "Come in and I'll get you something hot to drink."

Through the rain, through the gray, his eyes of tropic blue found hers and she watched the edges of his lips soften. With a hum and a nod, he followed her up the stairs and into the house, closing the door behind him.


	43. Chapter 43: Stray VI

_it's been a while, hasn't it? First off, my apologies to my reviewers - I'm terrible behind on replies thanks to life in general. I WILL get to them. Just - shortly. In the meantime, have an apology in the form of something new. And, to all my best beloveds and my gentle readers - please accept this as a late Hanukkah, early Christmas present. I hope it satisfies ;)  
_

Stray VI

by TamLin

He doesn't like the way she clings.

He doesn't mind it late at night when she's weeping silent tears. Her fingers curl into his fur and cling tight. In the dark, she wraps thin, waifish arms around him so tightly it should hurt. It doesn't. It feels like life. He likes it when she holds him so desperately. He likes the way she holds him when he comes back from hunting. Her body smells like flowers and it's soft. It feels good when she presses it close against his. She always held him and touched him before. Now that they are on the run though she holds him much more often. She has to touch him when he comes back, just before he goes. She always has her fingers in his fur or against his head or resting on his shoulder. He likes that even if he knows it's because she's still scared and hurt and that hurts him. He likes being needed though. He likes that the flower girl needs him.

He doesn't like it when she clings though. Because she clings to Cloud.

She doesn't do it when they come back from a hunt or late at night. Those touches belong to the dark haired girl with the pale face that is slowly growing more hollow. No, the flower girl doesn't touch the blond at all the way she touches him. But her fingers reach for the blond when she's not paying attention to them and when they find him, they linger. They catch like honeysuckle vines against the fabric of his shirt or the skin of his friend's arm and they cling despite everything, lingering and needy.

He knows it confuses his friend. Cloud has no social skills. He doesn't like touch, or didn't until the dark haired girl. He knows that skin that smells like flowers sends mixed signals to the blond. Cloud can't tell the flower girl not to touch though. She is still hurt and raw, the smell of her pain is still strong on her and Cloud has a weakness for wounded pups. He can see the way Cloud wants to protect and comfort – and the way his friend shies away from it because she is not a pup physically.

He sees the way the dark haired girl notices the touches and the way her eyes hollow. His friend doesn't see it – but he smells the hurt on the dark haired girl and he watches it drive the blond a little mad with confused frustration.

He loves the girl that smells like flowers. And sometimes he hates her.

He wishes she would cling to him like that. He wishes she would be honeysuckle vines against his skin. If she would – he would make her forget her pain. He already does, sometimes. For short times. When he plays silly games for her or licks her face or she scratches his stomach – her eyes forget to be so sad. She almost smiles. She does not do those things for his blond friend. She does them just for him. Except then he has to stop and the sorrow comes back and she looks from the corners of her eyes at the blond again.

Cloud does not see it. His friend only has eyes for his dark haired girl and the way she is slowly fading away. He notices though. He notices because he watches the flower girl the way she watches Cloud.

His friend tells him to change. Cloud smells the ache for the flower girl on him and, when they are alone, he tells him to let the wolf fall away and be human. It's easy for Cloud to say that. Cloud likes being human.

And his girl likes him human.

The flower girl is different though. She is not the dark haired girl that has always loved Cloud and always known he was human. The flower girl thinks he is a dog. She loves him as a dog. She has never seen his furless body. She will not love him on two legs the way she loves him on four. If he changes and comes to her, he will be a stranger. She will not love a stranger. If he changes in front of her, he will not simply be her dog anymore. He will not be safe for her the way being her dog is safe for her. Now she holds him and pets him and loves him. Now she holds him close and cries into the safety of his fur and tells him stories about her dead mothers, one going before the other. Now she trusts him and at night she sleeps with her head on his side, vine fingers curled around his paw. He does not want to lose that.

He is not sure he can bear losing that.

Cloud does not understand. He tries – but he can't. He can't understand that it is better to be a wolf than a human. Cannot understand that being human means remembering and that it is better not to remember. He does not want his flower girl to become like him. He just does not want to become like her either. He wants them to go back to the way they were, when the world was small and safe and there were bubbles in the water at night that he could chase with his teeth so she would laugh and he could lick the damp off of her skin afterwards even if sometimes it tasted like soap and he doesn't like the way soap tastes but it tastes sweet when it comes off of the flower girl's skin.

There are no bubbles in the water at night anymore and most times there is no soap. His friend's scent lays thick over the skin of his dark haired girl but even that can't seem to stop her from slowly growing more and more silent and thin.

The flower girl is thin too but she does not fade the way the dark haired girl does.

Cloud is slowly, silently, going mad.

They wake in the night, he and his flower girl, to the sounds of tears. The dark haired girl is crying in the dark, soft, whimpering sounds muted by sleep and darkness. There is the sound of his friend's body moving on the thin mattress the blond shares with the dark haired girl and the small broken sounds muffle. He hears the slide of fabric, smells the way the air heats and in the thin room he can hear the way the breathing changes. His flower girl's fingers tighten on his fur and she burrows close to his body. He can smell – something on her and it is dark and small and angry.

She should never be dark or small or angry.

He licks her throat and she presses her face into his fur the way she usually does but he can tell he doesn't have her attention the way he should. In his throat, he whines because that hurts. Why won't she love him the way the dark haired girl loves Cloud?

Except he is not human the way Cloud is.

Cloud has always been human in his head. Even when he was furred and had forgotten it, he thought like a human. Cloud says he has no wolf inside, nothing to guide him. He has always felt sorry for his blond friend. He has always thought of him as just a little… crippled. Now though, he almost wishes he were that way too. Because when he is furred, he is the way he should be – but when he drops the fur, he feels…

He feels wobbly. Naked. Lost. He feels as if he is not balanced anymore.

He remembers things he does not want to remember.

The next day the dark haired girl looks tired but her eyes are not dull. Cloud circles close to her, wolfish even though he looks human, and he does not stray far from her heels. The flower girl does not like it. There is no where for her honeysuckle fingers to go but around each other and they strangle themselves. He brushes against her bare legs and she pats him but she is not thinking of him. She is watching Cloud and the dark haired girl and she smells –

She smells like longing. It is a different smell than the one she has when she is clinging to Cloud. He watches her watching them and she is not watching Cloud. She is watching the two of them. A mated pair. Her pale vine fingers twist against each other and she makes an almost silent hollow sound. The dark haired girl turns her head to hear something the blond man never said and Cloud smiles shyly for her and the flower girl makes the noise in her throat again. It hurts his heart because it is a sound that says she is all alone. He whines in response because he is there too! But she turns away when his friend looks over at him and lets herself out the door of the small room they hide in during the day. The dark girl looks at him.

"Go, Zack," she catches the door before it can close and he suddenly wonders how much she understands that he doesn't. "Go get her."

She doesn't have to tell him again. He is out the still open door and already shifting his nose for his girl. It is a bad place they are in and the smells here are thick and fleshy and old. It is where they hide and where they hunt though. There are green eyes in the dark here somewhere and they circle in the twilight of the slums in feits and darts and retreats. The green-eyed dog does not want to fight both he and Cloud but he wants the flower girl and so he will not leave either.

She knows it as well as they do and she has not gone far. He catches up to her easily and whines as he presses his nose into her side. She is crouched on the high side of a concrete ditch and below the water is thick and old and soggy as it wiggles past. The smell is bad but she has her face buried in her arms and her hair is around her. He nudges her again and she finally opens her arms for him so that he can press close and she can wind tight around him. She has tears on her face and he thinks her eyes look like rain.

"I'm all alone." She muffles it against his fur and he whines again but she shakes her head. "I am. I don't have anyone and I – I'm terrible but I just want what they have. I shouldn't feel so jealous but – I'm all alone."

He wants to tell her that she's not alone. That he is with her. That he is always going to be with her. But he would have to say those things and he can't use words when he is a wolf. And if he is not a wolf he doesn't think she would want him to say those things. So he butts his head hard against her chest and aches in his own.

"I know, Coal. I'm selfish. I've got you. Until your owner comes. It's not your fault. I'm sorry. I'm sorry."

He will make things okay for her. He will! The same way he made them okay for Cloud so long ago. He just – he doesn't know how and it's tearing him apart and –

His head snaps up and it's instinct that has his teeth barring. He's lunging forward to protect his flower girl before he even realizes why. He catches the sick smell in the air, like old wounds gone sour and before he can even brace properly, there's something landing on him. Its heavy and rotten feeling and it snaps at him with broken teeth and claws at him with scaly claws. He sees a pale face with the bones in the jaw all wrong and pale eyes like pus, all white and sick green tinted. It fastens brittle teeth on his ear and he screams in anger more than pain even as he feels the teeth breaking with the pressure the creature is putting on them. His flower girl screams behind him and he whirls to shake the broken beast off of him with its legs bent wrong and too long that keep trying to wrap around him and keep him from his girl. He catches a glimpse, sees pale honeysuckle skin and wide leaf green eyes and then she's gone. Over the side of the lip and tumbling down into the murk below. It is his fault. His and the creature on him for hitting her and unbalancing and he makes a noise he didn't know his heart could make. Furious, mad with rage, he throws himself on the ground, rolling and he hears things snapping that should not snap under his weight. Half blind with blood and spit and dust, he scrambles to his feet but the broken creature is still holding him and his girl is lost in the brown and she is dying –

And he feels as if he is too.

There's a sudden sound and the thing is torn off of him. He has half a breath of surprise to see the sleek golden wolf that has its jaws savaging the creature and then he's done. The leap carries him forward and the concrete scratches sounds under his nails as he skids down the embankment. There was nothing for her to hold – and she is not there holding anything. He goes into the murky water without a thought and it rushes up his nose and invades his ears. It is dark and his body floats and he can't see, can't feel with leather pads and wolf paws. He washes the fur away without a thought, growing fingers to reach, legs better made for kicking downward. His girl hasn't surfaced which means she can't swim. But he can and he does, pressing down into the thick liquid until his lungs burn. His reaching hands touch things, foul, old things. Things of slim and things of metal and things of bone that crumble under his grasp. He should surface and go down again – except she has not surfaced and if his lungs burn hers must burn even more. The water burns his open eyes and he moves his arms and his legs wide, needing to feel something. Any part of her.

He feels seaweed.

He feels fingers like limp honeysuckle vines.

He grabs fistfuls of both and bunches his legs under him to rocket him to the surface. His face breaks the murk and he inhales stench and rot and blood on the air, but it is air. It burns down into his lungs and he forces his girl's head higher than his, arm tight and jerking hard around her ribs. She retches – and gasps in air and his heart soars better than if there was suddenly sunlight in this terrible place. She struggles weakly and he makes a noise low in his throat, half whine, half croon of safety. She coughs and he tries to swim to the shore of concrete. His body aches and it is the wrong shape for swimming that way but he can't change without letting go of her and so he flops forward until he finds solid ground. Cloud is above him, smelling of blood and himself and the dark haired girl and fury and fear and Zack will tell him everything is all right. In a moment. When he is sure his girl is safe and he can breathe right again. He presses her to the concrete, half out of the sludge and sneezes to clear his nose, his own body pressed close to hers to keep her from slipping back into the muck. She makes a sound like tears and he lifts his face to her, blue eyes half hidden by dank, black hair.

He sees her eyes widen and he sees the understanding finish filling them.

And then she hits him.

It is her little fist and she is too weak to hurt him but her words do worse.

"Beast," she calls him and inside he begins to die as her small fist hits his shoulder again. "You beast." There are tears down her muddy face and she suddenly seizes his hair in both her fists and pulls. He yelps – and then her lips are over his and they are dirty and shaking and beautiful like honey.

"How could you make me wait so long?" she asks with tears and then she kisses him again and he thinks that being a man isn't so bad after all.


	44. Chapter 44: You Don't Call Her Baby

**You Don't Call Her Baby**

by TamLin

"Why don't you ever call her 'baby'?"

Reno was, obviously, pretty far gone in his cups to ask the question and Cloud's eyelids barely flickered as he did his best to pretend the red head wasn't in the same city, much less same room. Reno however was intent, the thought lodged in his sluggy brainpan process and he dropped his elbows on the countertop hard enough to make one of Cloud's eyes twitch at the sound of bone hitting polished wood. Reno would feel that in the morning.

Contrary to popular belief, Reno didn't often get drunk. He drank – but he was too professional – and too rightly paranoid to over do it. Most nights.

Most nights Cloud didn't have more than a single drink himself, more because it was 'normal' than because it effected his metabolism. A cup of coffee had more of an effect on him than most booze. But tonight he'd put down three of Tifa's hard drinks and was slowly, methodically working his way through a fourth. Most nights he would have tossed Reno out of the bar since technically it was closed. Most nights.

Most nights however weren't the anniversary of the dropping of the Plate on Sector Seven back when there had been a Midgar to drop things on. And most nights weren't a reminder that most of AVALANCHE felt just as responsible for that drastic step as the Turks that had carried it out. So it was, perhaps, a type of penance, that Cloud and Reno both ended up in the same closed for the night bar, trying to drink their way towards a night, for once, without dreams. Two sides of the same guilt with just as much reason to blame themselves as blame their impromptu drinking partner.

Reno, for the moment however, had swallowed enough to move past silent guilt and into a thoughtful kind of musing stupor.

"Yo!" One of those elbows prodded Cloud's arm and Cloud shifted without thought on his bar stool to break the contact. Reno persisted.

"Chocobo-boy – you never call her 'baby'. Or 'cuddles'. Or 'lover' or 'squirt' or 'bombshell' or 'racks!'…"

The last nickname had Reno pausing in blurry eyed, smiling contemplation and Cloud cleared his throat and shifted again. Shaking his head, Reno pulled back to his current quandary, focused hard to remember where he'd been going with his line of thought and finally asked:

"You two are a thing – yeah? So why no stupid love names, yo? Or – " his smirk went sly. "You save those for calling each other naughty things in bed?"

Cloud was tempted to just shut his eyes and tune the red head out but that left the disturbing option of leaving Reno to imagine what kind of 'naughty' things he and Tifa called each other in bed and he couldn't tell if he was more uncomfortable with the idea of the red head thinking of them in bed or the red head's no doubt creative store of names that he would fit into the mental imagings.

"Tifa's not a baby," his voice was a bit throaty and he cleared it again, blaming it on the liquor after a day of silence on his part and not the mental images that had flashed through his mind at the mention of 'Tifa' and 'bed' and 'him' and how much of a Very Good Idea that sounded like right now. This instant.

If she wasn't stashed upstairs in the kids' room, sleeping next to Denzel so he wouldn't wake up alone tonight of all nights…

"Sure she's not," Reno slumped forward onto the bar, arms across it while he stared at his drink. "But s'what guys do for their girl, right? Call 'em cutesy names to show they love them or some shit like that."

Cloud contemplated it.

He loved Tifa. Always had. Always would. And it was finally out in the open and cleared up for them to the point where they both felt as if it was okay to show it in their own quiet, private kind of way. He had always wanted to please her, make her happy and he knew he was stunted when it came to things like social interaction. Some days he was almost afraid to come home, thinking over something he'd said without thought that morning that could have come across wrong or worried that her silence or his silence earlier in the day _meant something_ and he was just too dense to figure it out. This was all new to him and he had no template to base his actions off of. Would a good boyfriend call Tifa 'baby'?

Tifa. Baby?

He's heard a few drunks too far gone in their cups call her that before and she seemed to react… poorly to it. Brows wrinkling over his eyes, still staring at his hand wrapped around the glass, he carefully stated:

"I don't think Tifa likes being called 'baby'."

Reno rolled his head and contemplated the ceiling through one eye.

"What about 'honey'?"

Cloud's chin ducked a little while he thought that over as well. 'Honey' wasn't a bad word. Honey was sweet but it was healing too, soothing and strong and he liked the way it looked when she took the jar out and the sunlight would catch in that amber color and make it look like trapped sunshine.

Then he tried to imagine himself slipping the love name into a conversation with her and his lips curled in disgust.

"I can't call her 'honey'," he stated flatly.

"Sugar buns?" Reno suggested in sing-song and Cloud made a noise low in his throat.

"No."

Reno sighed and finally got one arm under his cheek, thoughtfully turning the glass in front of him.

"Well, ya gotta call her somethin', yo. It means you're a couple, right? An' you want everyone to know you're a couple. Especially her. S'bonding or something."

Cloud blinked and frowned down at his own drink. Realizing he hadn't touched it recently, he took a swallow of it and then set it back down. He'd heard about couples doing things, small, intimate, private things that made them feel more like… well, a couple. And he heard people call their significant other silly things before. It had just never occurred to him that _he_ should.

What if Tifa wanted him to call her something silly and sweet? What if she was waiting for him to call her 'honey'. Or… or something else. He remembered the way her eyes had gone all soft and liquid and warm and happy the time he'd referred to her as his 'sweetheart' when he'd had to clarify their relationship to Marlene. So… maybe he was supposed to call her something when they were together in private…?

Dumb-founded but determined, now that it had been brought to his attention, that he was going to do this right by her, he scoured his brain for an appropriate term. Reno, seeing the furrowing, helpfully offered:

"Heart of my soul? Baby-cakes? Snuggle bunny? Muffin? Jugs?"

"No." Cloud was firm and the look he shot Reno wasn't exactly friendly. Reno snorted laugher and turned his face into his arm to stifle it. After a minute, voice muffled, he said:

"You gotta think of something, bright boy. Girls like the mushy stuff."

"Cloud?"

Tifa's voice came to him from the stairs, soft and sweet and warm, wrapping him up in acceptance and belonging. He turned toward it as naturally as if she had a string to his soul and she'd just tugged.

She was standing on the last step, feet bare, sleep mused and soft looking. All pale skin and dark, welcoming eyes. She was beautiful and she was home and she was everything he'd ever wanted and so much more than he'd ever expected. Her face was a little worried – about him – and a little tired and the only face he would always see when he closed his eyes and thought of the way his heart hurt and lightened at the same time. He wanted to pick her up and carry her back upstairs and soothe all that tired worry away. He wanted to tuck close in her arms and not dream tonight because she would guard him. He wanted to see her smile and be her hero and he wanted to hear her scream his name again the way she had last week when the kids had been staying with Barret.

He wanted her to stay with him forever. Even if he couldn't find the right love name to show her that. Because all that came out when he opened his mouth was:

"Tifa."

"Aw, hell," Reno grumbled next to him. "Never mind, yo. You've already got your stupid sweetheart name."

Which didn't make sense to Cloud at all but Tifa's eyes still softened and went happier and more relaxed when he said her name and it made his own shoulders unknot in response. She held out one of her hands.

"Everyone's piled onto Denzel's bed. But it doesn't feel right yet." Across the room her eyes found his and he was moving, pushing awkwardly back from the bar before she even finished speaking. "Would you come too?"

His legs felt steady enough and it didn't take many steps to reach her. Without a word, he picked her up in his arms and carried her back up the stairs. To his waiting family and the place he belonged most in all the world. Reno sniffed as he watched them go. Then he looked back at his drink.

"Looks like you an' me are closing down the bar again." He thought about it a minute and then lightly patted the top of the glass. "Snookums."


	45. Chapter 45: Trying

_the prompt was 'he'd have to make sure he kept his hands to himself'. We'll see how well Cloud did at that..._ _Set at the beginning of the game, right before Kalm._

**Trying**

by TamLin

There was too much skin.

There was _really _too much skin.

The clothes Tifa usually wore showed off skin. A lot of skin. But there was something about the splashes of red – the scarred leather of the gloves, the drying blood red of the steel toed shoes – that warned a body to back off. That the skin wasn't for touching, that there was an enforced, invisible armor backed by those dangerous washes of red that would retaliate if the distance between safety and that pale, soft looking skin was ever breached. He remembered that his mother had told him red was always a sign to stop, of danger, and that was why so many of the snakes and insects and berries around the mountain wore it. Red was to warn you off, to tell you to keep your distance or you'd regret it.

So Cloud understood the message behind the red that Tifa wore. He respected that message on an almost subconscious level.

Stop. Don't touch. Go away.

Except she wasn't wearing red now…

Now, by moonlight, there was only black and white and silver. On her clothes, in her hair. Against her skin…

He'd woken up for watch to find her gone and Barret wearing a scowl and watching a single direction instead of the entire camp.

It was lousy soldier work and so he'd let the older man suck it up and stay up watch longer while he went in that direction. Not at all surprised to find Tifa but a little puzzled to find her kneeling by a small, cold stream they'd gotten their cooking water from not that many hours ago.

It was obvious she'd taken off her shoes to soak her feet. Their warning red was crouched nearby, socks neatly folded over the tops of her boots and for the first time he realized she wasn't used to walking for miles each day. That none of the others were and he realized with a sudden bolt that it hadn't occurred to him to worry about their feet and blisters and aching muscles the way it should have. Getting away from Midgar, reaching Kalm, had seemed more important.

He'd been a bad team leader and the way it twisted his gut was more than it merited, he knew. It didn't stop that knowledge, that he'd failed them, let them suffer through his own carelessness, from sending a clammy clench down through his gut of guilt.

He was supposed to take care of them.

He was supposed to take care of her…

But she wasn't soaking her feet now. Instead she was on her knees in front of the stream and he could see the muscles moving in her arms as she worked with almost manic determination. Scrubbing again and again a white ball of cloth before dunking it silently into the water and then pulling it out to wring it clear and then begin all over again. Eventually he realized it was her shirt and his brows came down even more as he watched her scrub it fiercely together and then rinse it only to begin the entire process all over again.

He hadn't realized she was wearing only her sports bra. It covered almost as much as the shirt had.

His focus was good. The skin of her hands was going red with the bite of the water and the silent fury of her washing.

Red.

Stop.

Don't proceed.

It was the only bit of red in her now. Her lips and her eyes were both washed to softer, quieter colors in the moonlight and he responded to it, stepping out from the treeline.

Her eyes snapped around, narrowing as her hand clenched but she relaxed in her spin, facing him but no longer defensive. It didn't matter. Her fists weren't red and he didn't pick up on their warning. He was caught instead by the fact there was water in her eyes and sprinkled across her cheeks. She reached up and the back of her hand smeared the drops, spreading ice water across her already pale cheeks and she gave him what she probably thought was a small smile. It was actually a heart broken, lost one and he recognized those better than he recognized happy or hopeful smiles.

He said her name and she sniffed and the smile stayed. The cheek got another scrub but the action didn't pull any color into the paleness of it.

"Sorry," she apologized. "Is it my watch? I was just – " her hand with the soaked shirt waved weakly and her face threatened to fall apart in front of him. Silent he watched her pull herself together, heard the shaky exhale in the silent night air.

"It smelled like smoke."

She tried to state it calmly but her voice broke on the last part and her face followed. And he finally understood.

Smoke. Because the air had smelled like smoke, a clogging, sick, oily kind of sickening smoke when the Plate dropped on Sector Seven. That foul stench of burned metal and broken bodies, of blood in the air and fires burning under fallen concrete and asphalt, it had soaked everything immediately afterward. Them too, he guessed, though he hadn't paid attention to it at the time.

Hadn't paid attention to anything but rescuing the girl that ShinRa had. Knowing, somehow, that no one should be left in ShinRa's 'gentle' care for any amount of time or something terrible, something he couldn't understand but that left his stomach cold and rotten feeling, would happen to them. Something irreversible.

He'd missed the way the smoke of a destroyed city had clung to them even as they'd climbed above it.

Tifa hadn't.

She's smelled it the whole time. Through labs and prison cells and posh executive offices. Through grasslands and moonlight night.

Maybe she could still smell it…

He stepped forward but she'd already hunched into herself, drawing her knees up protectively in front of her, arms around them, face hidden behind the careful barriers of her own flesh and blood and bone. She was all skin then. Fresh and soft and sweet looking in the moonlight.

He didn't hurt. Not the way the rest of them did. He hadn't known Biggs and Jessie and Wedge like Tifa and Barret had. He hadn't found a home in one of the crushed buildings or found out the name of the gossip loving woman who lived a few doors down from the bar. He was ex-SOLDIER. He was stronger than broken emotions or pain over people he hadn't promised, hadn't been paid, to protect. People died in wars and this was a war against the most powerful corporation in the world. He was too tough to let something like that affect him. Too strong.

Except when she crumpled, when he had to face what had happened instead of what was happening – all he wanted to do was touch that soft skin of hers and forget. He wanted the rest of the world to go away and he wanted to remember only how soft she was and how warm she would be.

Ex-SOLDIERs didn't fall apart and they didn't need to hide themselves in someone else's comfort. They _were_ the comfort.

Or at least the rock for everyone else to rest against and stay safe in the shelter of.

He'd have to make sure he kept his hands to himself.

That was going to be hard to do though, because she was still curled into herself and he was on his knee next to her before he really thought about it. Face buried, voice muffled and broken, he heard her apologies. Apologies for bothering him, for being this way. He didn't want her apologies though. He _wanted_ to be there for her. Wanted her to fall apart for him, to know that she could and it was alright. That he would hold and protect her. That he would catch her and keep her together.

He needed to do that for her. Needed to be able to be there for someone that mattered…

Except he didn't know what to do. What he _wanted_ to do was take her in his arms. But they weren't close that way. He hadn't earned the right to cradle her body close to his, not yet. And he couldn't touch her right until he had because – because he was pretty sure that the need to touch her was weakness on his part.

Because he needed to touch her all the time – and it was strongest when he was feeling unsure or weak or lost. She needed someone better than that though and so until he was, until he was sure he was, he wouldn't let himself give in to the need to clutch her close and hang on as if he was afraid of losing her at any moment.

Real men weren't that way. Real men were never afraid or unsure. He'd be a real man. For himself – and because it was what she deserved.

A _real_ man.

Keeping his touch gentle, aware of his exaggerated strength, he pressed one hand to her bare shoulder and the other to her knee. The leather of his gloves protected him from the worse of it but he could still feel her warmth and the give of her flesh through the material. Too soft. Too sweet. Face expressionless to combat it, he continued to gently push, slowly prying her open from the clam like way she'd closed over.

She let him. It was obvious she'd rather not. But she still let him. And her eyes went wide and confused when her shifting to a sitting position didn't stop the steady pressure of his hands.

"Cloud - ?"

There was something about her voice like that when it was lost and yet trusting that tore right through the middle of him and left a gaping wound there but he simply kept his face emotionless to deal with it and continued to push.

Anyone else would have fought him.

Tifa, hesitant, chin tucking defensively, still let him push her down until she was lying flat on the ground.

She didn't repeat the question of his name but it was in her dark, moonlight filled eyes as they looked up at him. Careful, not about to try to explain what he couldn't understand himself, he gently pried the small sliver of soap she had left out of the hand that wasn't still knotted in the fabric of her abused, soaking shirt. And then, very carefully, very, very intent, concentrating because this was so much more important than hitting the right button or measuring guard movements or picking the right air vent to crawl through, he took the ribbon out of her hair and carefully set it to the side before lifting the thick weight of her dark hair and setting it in the water.

The little gasp she gave would haunt his more heated dreams, he knew, but he pretended he didn't hear it, busy making sure her hair got wet almost all the way to her scalp. Then, still concentrating hard, he rubbed the soap between his fingers until it lathered. Sure about what he was doing now, he gently worked it into the thick tresses of hair he lifted out of the water. Her wide, confused eyes didn't leave his face and he didn't let anything show there for her to see, instead focusing his attention on that thick hair.

It slide between his fingers like silk, wet and gleaming, so long he couldn't imagine how she kept it so smooth and soft looking all the time. It tangled around his fingers, the bare skin of his forearms as he worked and he knew that that sensation too would go into the dark dreams of silk and liquid and soft cries that sometimes sounded like his name and sometimes sounded lost and far away. Careful to keep strands from tangling in the metal of his bracer, he was determinedly thorough, working the lather through all her hair, even to her scalp, rubbing against her skin there, careful to keep it from dripping into her eyes or her ears. Those dark eyes that slipped closed against her will as he rubbed gently and the bolt of sheer pride it fed his ego was enough to keep him going for weeks.

The way her shoulders and face and fingers relaxed as he kept working fed something softer and quieter inside his soul and stopped the constant ache for a little while. An hour, a night, it was longer than he'd felt that peace in all his remembered life. Despite himself it made his own lips soften and the very edges of them, hidden from her by her closed eyelids, curved. Between his fingers, her hair was slick and the color of warmth and home and soft, golden light on polished wood counters. Her breathing steadied and then slowly relaxed.

Very careful, because it was more precious and important to him than anything else in the world felt, he rinsed her hair clean of the soap. Washing away the smell of smoke, washing away the taint of ShinRa air. She deserved mountain streams and clear water and forever skies that stretched away into perfect mornings and endless dawns. He couldn't give her those – but he could take away the bad things at least.

He wanted to take them away forever for her.

Eventually her hair was clean and the water ran clear again and he had only let himself stall just a little. She had a lot of hair though and of course it would take time to make sure it was all ready for her again. His hand at her shoulder was a nudge and she sat up slowly in response as he shifted, wringing the hair carefully. Not wanting to leave wet strands against her pale skin to make her cold. He didn't have a towel to dry it with and he promised himself that next time she needed him he'd be better prepared. Instead he braided it, a surprisingly easy thing for his fingers to remember doing and he felt the vague flash of a memory of his mother letting him braid her hair because he'd wanted to help her.

Ex-SOLDIERs didn't braid hair though. Or admit they knew how to do it. His fingers fumbled suddenly, forgetting the pattern they'd been weaving. Fumbling, he gave up for fear of messing things up, and awkwardly handed the rest of the loose hair to her over her shoulder. He didn't want to see her face or the look in her eyes and so he stood up and casually brushed off the knees of his pants. The way she murmured his name was soft and a question and did something funny to his stomach all the way down to his toes. He shrugged in answer and shook his head. Tough ex-SOLDIERs didn't fumble around pretty girls – girls that meant the entire world to them – but at the moment, he couldn't seem to think of what they did do. So instead, he straightened up and shook his hands, leather soaked through. Still without looking – still not wanting to see whatever was in her eyes or on her face because it would crush him he was sure, he turned and headed back the way he'd come, making sure to keep his stride confident and careless.

It was just a hair washing. No big deal. Nothing to make a fuss over.

Just fodder for dreams of silk and sighs in his sleep from now until the end of his life.

She spoke just as he hit the tree line though and it wasn't the words that put the stutter in his step and the flutter in his hollow chest so much as the way her rich, soft voice said them.

"Thank you… Cloud…"

It was going to be harder tomorrow, than it had been today, to keep his hands to himself.


	46. Chapter 46: Awkward

_a 200 word drabble for demonegg's birthday. I **thought** I had already posted this here but apparently not. Sorry for that and I hope you enjoy :D_

**Awkward**

by TamLin

"She's hot!"

"Zack… shut up."

"No, man. I mean like _hot_."

"Zack – "

"Dude, pull your head outta that manual and smile at her when she comes over. She's – bombshell hot. … yowzah hot. 'If I wasn't already taken I'd – "

"Zack!"

Zack relented but only with a reproachful look at his friend whose spiky head still hadn't risen above his book to gape at the stunning waitress taking care of their section of the café.

"I'm tellin' you, man…" he murmured through half closed lips as she swung over toward them, giving him a glorious view of just how nice those uniform shirts could look on the right figured girl. Sure, he was happily taken but a guy had to notice someone like _that_.

Except for Cloud apparently, who only shifted his empty coffee mug from the inside of his book and held it absently near the edge of the table.

"Smoooo – kiiin."

"Zack."

"Hi!" There she was with a smile, practically glowing with the happiest eyes Zack had probably ever seen… seconds before she bent down and planted a generous kiss on the lips of the blond, navigating the book as if it were second nature. A kiss which, to Zack's astonishment, Cloud returned and didn't exactly rush through either. If blue eyes could smirk, the blond's were as Cloud finally came up for air and gave the man sitting across from him a lazy smile over the top of the book.

"Zack. This is Tifa. My girlfriend."


	47. Chapter 47: Interim

I am very, very behind and I'm sorry for that. I've got something big coming up hopefully by November however and it's eating up a lot of my time and concentration right now. I've still been beastly with not replying to all the sweet reviews I've been left for the past few months and with not really putting out updates as much as I should. I'm sorry about that. November though. Hopefully it will all be ready by November. In the meantime, a small apology and thank you for everyone's patience. Both of these were done for our very own sorrowsflower on her birthday. They're short so I grouped them together. A bit of a poem/character study and a 100 word drabble (and we all know how bad I am at keeping drabbles down to just 100 words). Thank you, gentle readers and o best beloveds. Stick with me just a little bit longer and I'll be back._**  
**_

_**His world**_

by TamLin

_He watches the rain  
Not through the glass of the window  
But instead he watches its reflection  
Against her pale skin as she sleeps.  
_

_He watches the sun  
Not with eyes on the sky  
But instead he watches the way it  
Catches in her hair when she turns suddenly to look at him.  
_

_He watches the moon  
Not by the shadows it casts on the wooden floor once the lights are gone  
But instead he watches it fill the hollows  
Of her collarbone and wonders if trapped light has a taste.  
_

_He watches the world  
Not by the rushing blur it gives him as it unwinds in front of his eyes  
But instead he watches it in every shade and shadow and point of light  
That shows over her quietly expressive face._

100 word drabble - also for sorrowsflower on her birthday - last year. I really need to clean out my LJ stuff more often._  
_

**Icy**

by TamLin_  
_

_Icy air. Red cheeks, crisped exhales. Laughter like icicles except it makes him warm in the pit of his belly like hot apple cider. He's hiding in a stand of bare trees, longing, content. Tifa is learning to skate with her mother._

_He's in love._

_Bitter cold air. Slush puddles. Gray snow. A frozen, flooded parking lot. Laughter like shivers. Tifa is teaching her family to skate. He already knows how but he prefers to watch as Denzel trips and skids along with pride and Marlene clings to the only mother she's ever known. They're smiling._

He's still in love.


	48. Chapter 48: Because Yuffie Says It's Ok

_a direct sequal to 'Because the Kids Say It's Okay' because it was requested and for One of a Beautiful Kind who's birthday is today and asked for a prompt for 'September'. Happy birthday! Hopefully ffnet will leave in the story breaks this time._**  
**

**Because Yuffie Says It's Okay**

by TamLin

"No, Tifa. Like _this_!"

Yuffie was determined and Tifa couldn't help but watch with a certain mixture of exasperation and laughter as the smaller girl dipped impossibly far to one side, impossibly far to the other and then finally backward to release a long square of brightly colored silk. Tifa, holding her own silk handkerchief, stifled a laugh.

"You look like you're drunk. Or on a ship and sea sick."

"Hey!" Yuffie spun around to scoop up her fallen handkerchief with a pout. "I'll have you know that's the way _professionals_ do it!. It's like dancing. Only boring. And you gotta make sure your handkerchief lands in Cloud's lap. Don't let some other guy end up with it by accident."

"I am _not_ throwing bits of cloth at Cloud tonight." Tifa's arms got crossed over her chest. As if that would somehow distract from the red on her cheeks. Yuffie snorted laughter.

"Oh, come oooon, Teef! You two are like practically engaged. I mean, you two hardly even came up for air last night at the koi pond."

Tifa's eyes went wide and if anything her cheeks only got redder. It was hard to tell if it was with embarrassment or anger though.

"You saw that?"

"Duh," Yuffie rolled her eyes dismissively and returned to her exaggerated swaying, silk popping up in the air to flutter over her shoulder. "I AM the Great Ninja Yuffie. But come on! You guys are all official and all now. Everybody knows it. So you gotta take the next step and get engaged so everyone can ooooh and aaaaah over the ring and all. And that means you've gotta give Cloud your handkerchief."

"Yuffie," Tifa was chiding now and she shook her head. "I'm glad we accidentally showed up for your festival. I really am. But throwing things at Cloud at the party tonight isn't – " she paused and exhaled and Yuffie stopped stomping absently on her own handkerchief. "I don't need to do that kind of thing with Cloud. He knows how I feel. And – I finally know how he feels. So it's okay if we take some time and just enjoy what we've got. When he's ready for whatever comes next… he'll be ready."

"Aw… that's really zen of both of you," Yuffie sighed peacefully, eyes shut. And then proceeded to wave her hands in the air, silk flaring as her eyes popped open again. "But it's too slow! I want wedding cake and I wanna let off stink bombs at the reception. I want Cid to give drunk toasts and I wanna get pictures of Barret pretending he's not crying and I want Cloud to force Vincent to wear something other than that leather and felt he lives in. What about me? What about MY needs? Have you thought about _those_?"

"Gee, Yuffie. I hadn't. Thanks for pointing out how selfish I've been. I'll get right on fixing that." Tifa had been around the little ninja long enough by this point that she had no hesitation in dryly answering that tirade.

Yuffie started cackling.

"You never let me get away with anything anymore, Teef." She bounced over to link her arm through Tifa's. "I'm just teasing. Geez, like I really care if you guys get it together or not." After a minute, she added thoughtfully: "Maybe if we tied a stone to your handkerchief and nailed Cloud in the forehead with it at the party he'd get the hint."

(~)

The night sky was full of man-made stars. Tifa held her own lantern as Cloud set flame to the small candle inside it, and the warm, gold glow soon spread from the paper to paint both of their faces in its warmth. Slow she lifted her hands and just as slow the tiny paper lantern filled with hot air and drifted up to join the myriad of others already drifting in the quiet night air. She knew it was probably a fire hazard but it was a Wutai tradition to celebrate the beginning of autumn and she thought they were probably used to any dangers floating paper lanterns could cause. A long silk dragon with a myriad of differently clothed pairs of legs wove in between the lantern setters, left over from the more boisterous streets and party of earlier that night, stopping in front of Tifa to shake it's huge head and wink a brightly painted tassel eyelid at her before steaming off, its tail made longer by the laughing children that were chasing after it. Tifa though it had been a long time since she'd felt so…

"Young."

Cloud's soft voice near her ear caught her attention and she turned into him as he stood next to her. In the golden night, he slipped an arm around her waist and she leaned a little into him.

"What?"

"You look young," he answered just as softly as her question. When she looked at him he was looking up at the lanterns in the sky but her move had him glancing down at her face and his lips shifted, almost shy and a little embarrassed looking. They'd come a long way together but each step forward was one they'd never taken before and there was a certain amount of care in the way they treated each other. To show him it was all right, Tifa let her head rest on his shoulder and felt it relax under her.

"I feel young. Like… like it's been forever since I remembered to enjoy the simple things without worrying about them."

"It's been a long time since it was safe to be young," he murmured, eyes going back to the floating lights in the sky. A sky empty of burning smoke or metal Plate or dying meteor. A sky full of nothing but moon and floating paper dreams. All ready some of the smaller lanterns were starting to sink and people dressed in brightly colored costumes ran between the small groups of waters, trying to catch them before they could touch the ground and taking bright leaps over the ones that already had before scooping them up as well. Tifa thought that Cloud's face looked young too. She was glad he'd asked her to come with him on his Wutai delivery this time and a part of her wondered if he'd known the country would be celebrating their Mid-Autumn Festival. Cloud had a way of giving her gifts while pretending to be unaware that he was giving them.

"The kids would have loved this," she murmured and found that, at some point, she'd turned more into him and both of his arms were around her now. She slipped her own arms around him in turn, still watching the sky through the fringe of his hair. He made a soft sound and rested his chin against the side of her head.

"Next time we'll bring them."

And it made her heart feel lighter because there would be a next time. They could plan on 'next time' now. Finally. She hugged him a little tighter and sighed out in contentment.

"Next time," she agreed.

(~)

"So it was pretty cool, huh? They don't have parties like that in Edge!"

Yuffie was still bouncing, though nicely enough she'd settled down to bouncing on the sleeping pallet on her side of the room. Tifa had agreed to spend the night with her for what Yuffie insisted was 'girl time' and Cloud had good naturedly been banished off to his own room, which happened to have been the one they'd first all slept in as a team while chasing a madman across the Planet. Now Tifa, clad in her pajamas, folded the colorful, quilted jacket Yuffie had given her to wear to the party with a smile for the other girl.

"You're right. Edge doesn't. It was a lot of fun, Yuffie. We had a lot of fun tonight."

Yuffie made a face but it was obvious she was happy as she flopped down onto her back.

"I know! That's why Wutai is the best place ever. Better than boring old Edge."

Tifa gently set the jacket aside, hiding her smile. Yuffie loved to brag and she loved her home country… but she spent an awful lot of time in Edge for a place that was 'boring'.

"Cloud and I talked about bringing the kids next. It would be nice to have the whole family get away on a trip."

"You guys really like that whole 'family' thing, huh? 'Daddy Cloud'." Yuffie broke off onto snickers and Tifa stifled her own smile. Cloud was still working on the 'dad' part – but he was trying and the kids knew it. That was what really counted. The other day he'd even called Denzel his son in front of someone else. It had made Cloud blush – but the look on Denzel's face for the rest of the week had been the most beautiful thing Tifa had seen in a long time.

"As if you didn't enjoy being 'Aunt Yuffie'," Tifa teased right back, settling down on her own pallet and starting to brush out her hair for the night. Yuffie grinned.

"Aw, Marlene and Denzel are awesome! I don't mind playing auntie to them. They're devious."

"Don't encourage them," Tifa chided mildly, getting ready to stretch out in her own bed.

"Hey, hey!" Yuffie interrupted. "You gotta get your handkerchief. You put it under your pillow so you'll dream about who you're gonna marry. Did you get it back from Cloud?"

Tifa rolled her eyes and rolled over to grab the folded jacket.

"I didn't throw it at him in the first place, Yuffie. I told you – Cloud and I don't need to – "

The handkerchief was in the wrong pocket and she pulled it out, curious to find it heavier than a square of silk should be. A little puzzled, she shook it out into her hand.

The simple ring of unadorned gold caught the light from the lantern and glowed warm.

Something in her sudden stillness must have tipped Yuffie off because the other girl was suddenly next to her shoulder, looking at what she was holding. For a long minute they both stared in utter shock. Just as Tifa's throat started to tighten with impossibly happy tears Yuffie let out a whistle.

"Ooooor I guess you could skip the engagement ring all together and just go straight to the wedding band."


	49. Chapter 49: Just For You

_it was recently the lovely Fenikkusuken's birthday and I just had to do something for her. She's turning out an amazing version of 'what might have been' in the FFVII gameverse. If you haven't read her works yet, you really need to. And in the meantime, here's a little gameverse version of my own to wet your appetite. Hope you enjoy, best beloveds and o, gentle readers ;)_

**Just For You**

by TamLin

Tifa Lockheart didn't have nightmares.

She was the comforter, the protector, the soother. She was the one that others came to when_ they_ had nightmares. When Barret woke everyone up with his yelling, Tifa was the one that let herself into the room and woke him up, fast enough to dodge flailing arms and not fully awake attempts at defense. It was Tifa's bed that Marlene would crawl into in the middle of the night… and sometimes Jessie would too, with their equally lost eyes and their need for a warm, safe presence to chase away the lingering cobwebs of nightmare that clung to their sleep mussed minds. Even Biggs and Wedge would come and find her after one of their nightmares, hunching low over the bar, eyes looking anywhere but at her while she poured them a strong drink and didn't try to make them talk about whatever had driven them into the arms of AVALANCHE in the first place.

They all had their scars. Inside and out.

Tifa just kept hers hidden better than most.

So the first night she really slept after they found a strange blond SOLDIER with eyes like blue flames and a strange cold look on a face she remembered as softer and kinder, she didn't expect to dream. She'd been up late taking care of that same stray SOLDIER for almost a week, waiting for the strange fever that wasn't a fever but that kept him up and restless and then down and shivering to break. When it finally had, when she'd been sure it wouldn't come back and he'd looked at her concern with blank impatience, she'd finally let herself give in, close the bar for the night and go to bed early.

She should have slept like a log.

She was exhausted enough.

Her mind wasn't though and it traced backward down dark familiar paths in her sleep until the roar of the fire and the smell of things burning that should never burn filled her memory and her nose. Cold eyes of green jade hunted her through the clogging smoke and there was no traction for her boots on the blood slicked cobbles of the streets. She ran from those eyes – and she ran from the burned arms that reached from ruined doorways, reminding her that she should have died there with them and there was no real escape in the end.

And, as she always did, when she woke it was soundless and motionless.

Tifa Lockheart didn't have nightmares. Or, if she did, she hid them well.

Waking up in her dark room with the outside lights shining in through the patchwork curtain, disorientated and still full of the terror of the dream, it took her a second for her mind to sort through the pitch black and gaudy light color patterns of the room to notice the pair of glowing eyes in the dark near her doorway.

Every childhood monster and fairy tale goblin came rushing back to her in an instant, freezing her in a way no ShinRa guard ever could.

And then her eyes adjusted and a figure stepped forward and she recognized:

"Cloud – "

"Tifa."

His voice was low in the dark, just as broken shadowed as the room and so much less familiar to her. In that instant she didn't recognize the man in front of her at all. She'd assured Barret he was safe – staked all their lives on it – but there was very little from her memories of childhood that matched the haughty ex-SOLDIER who'd been all but dropped on her doorstep. His silence and his stillness did nothing to soften that foreign feeling now. Sternly chiding herself, she forced herself to sit up even though every instinct in her told her to get ready to fight. So she left her hands loose on the blanket in front of herself instead.

All or nothing. She trusted him with everything – or with nothing at all. When her movements still drew no response out of him, nothing but the darker shape of a soldier in the darkness and the unblinking of his glowing eyes, she offered a smile. Knowing already that it would come out broken and weak but what else would she do?

She had to believe in something.

Wise or not, she had chosen Cloud, years ago. It just seemed like too well worn a groove for her to escape now. She had to believe in something. Not for the dark form in front of her… but for herself.

"Trouble sleeping?" she asked and watched him almost shake his head. And then pause. Glowing eyes lidded and then lifted back to her with startlingly clarity.

"You were."

"I'm fine." She lied and it was automatic and route, a habit older than she could remember.

His glowing eyes narrowed and went flat and cold. And didn't believe her.

If she hadn't been so tired she would have felt ashamed to be caught so easily. Or angry. But tonight she was just tired. Bone deep tired and so her shoulders slumped but she didn't answer those glowing eyes of blue.

With a grunt that sounded almost satisfied, he took the last two steps to her bed, passing in and out of panels of dim light and only then did it occur to her that he'd let himself into her room as if he somehow thought he had a right. That thought scattered the second he leaned down to lift up the edge of her blanket.

"What?"

"Scoot over."

"Cloud?"

When she didn't immediately comply with his instructions, he simply sat down on the edge of the bed anyway and through sheer bulk forced her to scoot over unless she wanted him laying on top of her. A part of her still running down burning, forever streets, it took her mind a long moment to realize what he was doing even if she did automatically move over in the bed. Her years of living on her own, protecting herself, were kicking in with a vengeance. He was too close and he was between her and the door, had her trapped between him and the wall, could easily stop her if she tried to scream and was the only person, for a long time, that she knew without a shadow of a doubt was stronger than her. Much stronger.

"Cloud?" She said his name again and she almost felt as if she had to remind him who he was, remind both of them, before something horrible went wrong. He didn't answer. Instead he fussed on the bed as he settled onto his back, almost picky about how he settled onto the thin, lumpy mattress that only pretended to be a bed. When he was finally done, he rested an arm behind his head and shut his eyes. The glow disappeared.

Somehow it made him even more of a stranger.

Straight backed, Tifa stayed where she was, trapped between this stranger and the wall but even more importantly, trapped by her manners and empathy. She had every right to leave – but what kind of message would that send the man next to her? That she didn't feel safe around him? That she didn't trust him? He was certainly acting as if he had every right to be a part of a very private and off limits part of her life. He was acting like he had a right to be in her bed no less and some of her memories from childhood might be naturally dim but she knew for a fact even if they had been good childhood friends they'd never been that good. Her father had drilled her very carefully and thoroughly on what was 'proper' and sharing a bed with a man definitely wasn't a part of that.

In fact she'd never shared her bed with a man before and now she had one she'd dreamed about as a child, flat out and giving every appearance that he was going to go to sleep right there.

Was he still wearing his boots?

The distraction broke the way her mind was chasing its own tail around and around inside her head and she glared at the lumps in the blanket that looked suspiciously too big to just be sock covered feet. Cloud's breathing stayed slow and steady and he didn't twitch or open his eyes. Tifa shifted from watching his boots to watching his face in the unsteady light. Even softened by shadows, his face still looked hard.

Where was the shy boy that had promised to be her hero? Did SOLDIER really do that? Or had it been Shinra?

Very slow, Tifa sank back down on the bed, lying on her side because there wasn't really room for one of them to be on their back much less both of them. She was careful not to touch him and after a moment, she slipped her arm under her head. From the side his face didn't look so cold and tight. From the side she could see the barely there outline of his nose, his lips, his chin. His hair that had been the first thing she'd recognized about him.

He'd recognized her before she'd recognized him…

She had to believe in something…

Five years… Seven.

Cold blue eyes that glowed…

His warmth had already started to permeate the trapped air under the blanket and it was nice. The slums were always cold and clammy – except when they were hot and muggy. Tonight it was the first and it was nice to not have to huddle to keep warm enough. The almost silent sound of his breathing was nice too. Steady and soothing. She could watching his chest rise and fall with each inhale, each exhale. He didn't move other than that and she couldn't tell if he was asleep or not, even if she couldn't imagine he'd fallen asleep. Despite herself she found herself relaxing.

She couldn't decide if she should fight it or not.

Falling asleep with a stranger – a man – Cloud – in her bed was out of the question. It left her stupidly vulnerable and maybe even more worrying than that, it implied that it was alright. That she was comfortable sleeping with a man. A stranger. Cloud.

She opened her eyes, not having realized they'd closed, and he was still there, exactly as he'd been when she'd closed her eyes. Slow, even breathing. Her eyes slipped closed again and she fought them open.

How was she supposed to explain Cloud in her bedroom to everyone else in the morning? What if Marlene or Jessie came in tonight with one of their own nightmares?

Where was the shy boy? The proud boy?

The lonely boy?

Her eyes opened with a jerk and she realized she'd shifted somehow, now nudged up against his side, arms tucked in front of her. When had that happened? Had she fallen asleep? A quick peek upward showed her exactly what she'd seen when she'd looked last time. Careful, she scooted back to until there was the right amount of space between them again. It wasn't as warm but it was more appropriate.

She was going to have to talk to him about the boots…

Nobody should wear boots to bed…

When she woke up again, the room was still dark but the internal clock she carried inside herself in this place where the sun never rose told her it was early morning. She was cocooned in warmth and it was hard to finally pry her eyes open. Instead she snuggled deeper into her nest of blanket, nose pressing into the mattress and smelled –

Her eyes popped open and she sat up with a jerk.

Her bed, and the room, was empty, the door still shut and nothing changed or moved since she'd gone to sleep last night. Slow, she lowered her face to the mattress again and – maybe she smelled the slightest trace of that clean, wild storm scent she associated with Cloud…

Or maybe it was there because of all the nights of taking care of him that she'd collapsed into the bed.

Had she dreamed him last night?

Pulling back the covers she saw bits of dirt on the mattress and blanket down near the foot of the bed. His boots. Except it felt almost too surreal to be real. Cocky ex-SOLDIER Cloud didn't show up like a ghost because of nightmares and he certainly wouldn't have passed up the chance to make her feel awkward about it afterward.

Very slowly, she got up and changed, running through the routine of getting ready on autopilot. Had he? Had they? Or had it just been another part of her dream?

Downstairs, she got breakfast ready for everyone and when they all came in from the upper and lower rooms, her eyes avoided Cloud until she'd already looked at everyone else. No one looked at her with speculation or curiosity. Or anything other than early morning hunger for that matter. Cloud, when she finally looked at him, looked blankly back, glowing eyes calm and expressionless in his lean face. It embarrassed her that she'd even looked at him in the first place. Obviously she'd been dreaming and the dirt was from something she'd done and forgotten about at some point.

When everyone else took their plates from the bar though and went to settle at their tables, he lingered and when she looked back at him, his eyes locked with hers. For just that second there was something in that blue, something deep and old and young and protected and protective and – and something shared. Just for the two of them.

"It keeps away the memories," he muttered, before taking his own plate and heading to the single table he always sat at alone. Tifa blinked as she watched him go. And then Marlene plowed into her legs, clinging and smiling and asking to help and Tifa focused on the immediate.

It was only later, when they'd traveled together longer and she'd watched the splinters forming in his actions, that she wondered:

Just whose memories had that first night kept away?


	50. Chapter 50: To Walk A Mile in Your Shoes

_oh best beloved and gentle readers, it has been a very, VERY long time, hasn't it? I'm so sorry for being away so long. There's good news though because during that time I published a book! That's right! After almost five years from start to finish, jumping through hoops for publishers and agents, and innumerable rewrites (thanks to our very own _demonegg_ for editing the insurmountable) I finally managed to self-publish a book that I'm very proud of called _**Andromache: Stealing Tomorrow**_. Look me up on Amazon or order me from your local bookstore! ;) It's also what burned me out terribly on writing this past year though and there were times I'd be lying if I didn't say that one of the only things that kept me plugging along was the memory of the faith and the wonderful reviews I've gotten here. In thanks of that, I've put up the first two chapters of the book over on my LiveJournal site so everyone can read them. Website address is: kitsune13-tam . livejournal . com (spaces removed). Go, read, enjoy and know that I adore each and every one of you for being my cheering squad this whole time whether you knew it or not. And, because I know why you showed up in the first place, here's a not so short Cloud and Tifa story, written in tandem with Ves. She writes a truly amazing Cloud (everything of his in here is hers) and lets me enjoy writing Tifa in response to that. I hope you all enjoy this and if you like the -er, 'confusion', be sure to check out Fenikkusuken's much longer story _Learning Curve Continuum_ over on her ff page._

**To Walk a Mile In Your Shoes**

by TamLin and Ves

Tifa hated fighting floating women. They had the most annoying effect attacks. So when the pink cloud cleared away, she was expecting to feel lightheaded or dizzy or - something. What she was not expecting was how suddenly uncomfortable her clothes felt and when she glanced down to pull her shirt hem into place automatically, the sound she made at her suddenly very flat, very muscled chest was a stifled squeak.

It came out much lower in tone than she was used to.

The sound of some... Oddly delicate coughing echoed through the area, as Cloud waved an arm in a half-successful attempt to clear the air quicker. The noxious vapor that thing had expelled before it died was like a sickly sweet, cloying perfume, and he was thoroughly preoccupied with the unpleasant notion that he was probably going to reek of it the rest of the day. Still suitably disorientated, he hadn't noticed anything else amiss until-

"Hey, Tifa! You okay?" ..._was that __his__ voice_?

The sound Tifa made in response to Aerith's question was muted and weak as she confusedly patted her hands down her... chest. Her flat chest. Her really flat chest.

Wait... Aerith wasn't with the group at the moment...

Huge wine colored eyes rose from her own self-inspection that still wasn't registering in her brain to match what she was seeing and shifted to Cloud. A... shorter looking Cloud than she remembered...

Who'd... apparently stolen her chest...?

Slowly, reluctantly, it was beginning to sink in for her as Tifa put a surprisingly large hand over her mouth and blinked at -

"...Cloud?" The voice came out low and throaty. Tifa's fingers tightened even more across her much more square jawed face in growing horror.

For Cloud, meanwhile, that faint, uncomfortable noise he got in response to his question wasn't at all promising, and he took a few more hasty steps in the direction of Tifa's still sort of blurry silhouette through the fading pink mist before coming up to an abrupt stop. His belt was practically swinging around his waist where it hung from the straps over his shoulders - now just about the only things holding it up - and his armor was slipping out of place.

With no little irritation, he thought he was still suffering the effects of a Mini spell - at least until he reached over to tug his shoulder guard back up. Or tried to, anyway, stopping halfway as the inside of his elbow ran into something in the way... Under his shirt...

On reflex and a start, Cloud grabbed his chest. And then barked out a short yelp that was _incredibly less than manly _when he felt what was there.

"What the-!?" His voice was even higher pitched than Aerith's, actually, which probably wasn't doing him any favors as he took a horrified peek down his collar and immediately regretted it. Looking to Tifa for help yielded no better results.

Had she always been that tall...?

"Tifa?"

She nodded because she wasn't sure she wanted to hear that strange voice coming out of her again. The dawning understanding of what had happened was coming in fast but she was pretty sure she didn't want to know. Instead she just kept that too large hand over her mouth and stared wide eyed at Cloud as the mist cleared.

He was -

He was...

He was a _really_ pretty girl.

Hesitant, once he was close enough, she reached out with her other hand and touched his cheek. It was strange to have to reach down the littlest bit to do that... It was - his skin felt softer... rounder... under her fingertips than she remembered from the rare times she'd touched him in the past and to add to the oddness, her fingers were larger than she was used to. Brows starting to pinch over her still huge eyes, she very carefully gave him a once over, eyes visibly flaring when she hit his chest. Her fingers finally unwound from over her mouth enough for her to manage a worried, throaty:

"...oh..."

The fact that she hadn't said a word to him, yet, somehow rendered the whole ordeal in an even more surreal light (were it still possible). When she touched him, he jumped, but held his ground regardless, momentarily trapped in some kind of awkward trance as he stared right back.

It was definitely still Tifa in there - but looking from the outside, one'd barely know it. (Clothes aside, anyway.) The jawline, the brow, the height and the broad shoulders that made him feel so completely dwarfed just then (though that could've been partly his horrified embarrassment, too).

And perhaps the worst of it was that she made a better man than he ever had. Even if she looked pretty weird in those earrings.

"Don't- Don't stare at it. Let's just..." Grimacing in the face of that obvious shock, Cloud crossed his arms awkwardly over his chest. He'd never get used to the sound of his own voice (and it was almost worse, how it _was_ starting to sound familiar, especially that gruff, defensive tone). "Figure out a way to get back to normal."

Quick, Tifa's hand retreated to curl against her chest and her chin ducked.

"Right."

She had to wince at the sound of her own voice - it couldn't be hers - and her hand shifted to cup her elbow. Awkward, awkward elbow. Wincing again, she loosened the strap that held the metal plate guard in place there to account for the thicker arm.

"There's got to be a remedy. Or one of the materia."

Turning, determined to fix this quickly, she started for where they'd dropped their packs before the battle. Only to take a single step and then make a muted, distressed noise. Her fingers shifted to curl at the hem of her skirt. With a scowl, cheeks flushed bright red, she determinedly finished her trip to their packs and carefully, gingerly, settled on her heels next to them to start snapping them open for rifling.

The sooner she lost certain physical traits the better.

"I don't remember picking up any materia that did anything like _this_..." Cloud said. Not that that was a total condemnation of the idea, rather more the grumpy castoff of the whole ordeal. Watching the way she started and stopped on the short trip just over to their collective things (even though she was walking away, he caught a glimpse of that blush, too), Cloud couldn't hold down a sympathetic wince.

In his rather acute focus on the changes she'd undergone _above _the waist, he hadn't even considered just how ill-dressed she really was for... Being a man. He shifted uncomfortably where he stood, immediately regretting it (so... incredibly... uncomfortable), before making his way over after her as quickly as possible. And trying not to look. At anything. Or move. At all.

"Maybe the Transform...?" Because he could think of times when being a frog had been less embarrassing... And the only alternative that came to mind was the Enemy Skill materia, which he'd never even be able to look at again, if they had to learn a spell like _that_ with it.

It was disconcerting for Tifa as well and so she tried not to watch as man hands that did what she wanted them to searched through their packs for the right materia. She had to look to see what she was doing though and it was jarring. They wouldn't get stuck this way. They couldn't. Even if nothing worked there had to be a time limit to this - or someone in the nearby town would be selling something to counteract the effect.

Right?

Because as odd as her having hands like this was - it was really Cloud's voice she wanted back most. She'd learned to rely on that voice to make her feel less overwhelmed or scared. Not that she'd ever tell him. That was her secret. She really wouldn't have minded hearing its usual tone right about now. Sorting carefully through each materia's 'feel' she switched out the slots on her glove for the Transform and fit Heal into the other one. Worth a try? Her voice was soft gravel as she swiveled toward him, not standing, ready to go through every remedy they had immediately if the materia didn't work.

"Come here."

In the meantime, Cloud was finding it incredibly difficult to pretend he wasn't still having wardrobe malfunctions of his own. With an exasperated sound, he finally gave in and started fumbling to take off his belt (with the gloves that were too big for his hands, and the armor slipping off his wrist and shoulder following close behind). Without all of that leather and metal rattling around his no longer quite so well-fit form, he _almost _felt better.

Except he still couldn't even get into an irritated huff properly, trying to cross his arms again, once or twice, before admitting total defeat.

(_How am I supposed to deal with these things...?_)

It was a definite relief when Tifa finally came up with the right materia (or what he sincerely hoped would be right, anyway), no matter how unnerving the sound of that voice was. Stepping away from the messy pile he'd tossed his armor into and nearer to her, Cloud nodded, visibly bracing himself.

"Okay. Gimme your best shot."

"Mm."

Brows down in determination, Tifa gave a nod.

…he really did make a pretty girl - something she found even more intimidating than Aerith's femininity. Being in the bulky form she was in now certainly wasn't helping with the insecurity any either. The sooner they got this over with the better.

"Here goes."

It was his warning and she triggered the materia, sending the green tinged glow washing outward, centered on the figure in front of her. She tried her hardest to hope for the best, if positive thoughts meant anything at all -

_please let it work, please let it work, please let it work..._

- and yet the practical part of her had her squinting an eye open afterward, worried about what she was going to see.

_"Damn_—"

As much as he appreciated the effort, Cloud couldn't keep from uttering the short, sharp swear as the glow from the materia faded, and he found himself... Exactly the same as he'd been a moment ago. It was no salve to the wound on his pride that he hadn't somehow ended up in a worse situation, the furrow in his brow deepening as he shook his head, shoulders sagging noticeably.

"Nothing. "

Steeling himself against the intense discomfort that was walking anywhere, he stalked over to their gathered packs and, falling into an awkward crouch beside Tifa, began rifling through the collected inventory. It was beginning to seem as though the next town would be their best hope, after all - unless one of them had packed away a secret remedy for sudden gender misassignment, here, somewhere.

(_I definitely don't want to go shopping like this..._)

"It's no good. Maybe we should find another one of those monsters? One of them might drop something that'll help..." He didn't want to admit he was grasping at straws. (Or that he was unconsciously attempting to deepen the tone of his voice back to somewhere at least approaching normalcy - though that was another matter entirely.)

Nothing, she thought...

Which meant it wouldn't work on her either. Tifa had to stop herself from trying anyway, knowing it was just desperation and she wasn't going to give in to that. She could do this. She could... be a guy. For a little while at least. Half of the population did it every day. How hard could it be...?

Except even the smallest shift on her heels reminded her that she was built differently than before and even without the discomfort of the skirt, she wasn't even sure how to walk right much less anything more complex.

She was not going to panic however. Or let it get to her. She was going to be practical and deal with things sensibly - no matter how many times she had to remind herself to.

...Yuffie was never going to let her live this down. Or Cid. And her cheeks went red again at the thought of the playful teasing she could already imagine in her head from Aerith.

Switching out her materia, she very softly rested a hand on Cloud's back while he rummaged, triggering the Restore materia to take care of the cuts and bruises he'd gotten since the last time she'd hit him with some healing magic. If the materia couldn't fix their shape at least it could take away some of the minor problems with it, right? Instinctively keeping her voice quiet the same way he was trying to 'fix' his, she admitted:

"I'm not sure how to fight like this. I can figure it out though. I'd like - it might help if I had pants though. ...are there any Maiden's Kiss left?"

Cloud had made it a point to himself _not _to think of what the others would say - as it was, he'd already figured avoiding the potential for further humiliation by splitting up from here was probably their only hope of making it out of this with some modicum of dignity intact. Though throwing himself wholly into the potentially hopeless search for a last ditch solution was only aiding a little as he tried to convince himself that that wouldn't actually be a total abdication of his duties as de facto leader.

At that unanticipated Cure spell, he started again under her hand, pausing in his search only to wipe away a little blood where there'd been a shallow cut on his arm seconds before.

"Thanks." A short nod and a grateful glance over his shoulder later, he was redoubling his efforts to dig through their woefully disorganized supplies. (When had he even...? Oh, that was from...)

Fortunately, they'd been on the same wavelength in regards to remedies to attempt next, and it wasn't much longer before he was holding out the one and only Maiden's Kiss in the pack. And an Elixir, for good measure, if she was going to go around healing him like that without his even asking.

"Here. If this... Doesn't work, I'll—" Hopefully she wouldn't make him clarify. "-trade you."

Tifa was most definitely _not_ going to make him clarify. At his thanks, her lips shifted into a small, quiet smile though and her shoulders relaxed the smallest bit. When he handed over the items she took them but she paused over the Kiss. It was their last one. If it did work the other person would be left having to wait until they found another. She should really - her hand made an aborted shift.

No. Part of Cloud being Cloud was the quiet way he took care of everyone else - and part of her response to that was trusting him enough to let him when there was really no one else she let do that for her. She also thought - they both knew that. So instead she just gave him another quiet smile and a murmured 'thank you' before she broke the small globe in her hand, releasing the drift of contact cure. The honey smell filled the air and made her skin tingle - but that was all.

"Must have been the wrong maiden." She tried to make light of the failure. It was okay. She kept telling herself that. Something had to work eventually. They just had to figure it out. Taking a breath, she concentrated on swallowing down the electric taste of the elixir instead. The warmth flushed through her, making it easier to breath and she offered him another, slightly fuller smile.

"It'll be okay. We'll work it out."

For a second, he'd thought she might actually try to give the item back - and when she didn't, his relief at avoiding the inevitable argument (and the inevitable hypotheticals to follow) was evident just around the edges of his grave expression. He didn't like having to insist (and often did simply allow his executive decisions to be vetoed by the more persistent of their friends, present company included), but at times like these he'd not take no for an answer.

In spite of their situation, in spite of that utterly crestfallen twinge of disappointment that he'd fully been expecting, her slightly self-deprecating joke nearly prompted a smile out of him. Faint and with more than a twist of cynical amusement, perhaps, but real enough, just the same.

"Yeah. We'll figure something out."

Because he wasn't even beginning to entertain the idea of being stuck like this for any length of time - it was just like any other status effect, extreme as it might've seemed, at the moment. There was a cure; they just had yet to find it.

"Probably as easy as going into the next shop we see. ...But, first—" Well. He had promised. A little, miserable tint of blush rose in his cheeks as he scanned the area for any convenient shrubbery behind which they might be able to grasp at some fleeting modesty as they swapped the necessary elements of their respective outfits.

_(__Remind me never to travel without an extra pair, after this.__) _

She was glad it was Cloud. Not glad that he'd been stuck this way too - but out of everyone, if she was going to go through this with someone, Tifa was just glad it was him.

It was still taking some getting used to - hearing his voice so many degrees higher than usual.

His cut off sentence though had her eyes lifting in curiosity to find his, wondering what - oh. Right. Pants.

Cloud in a skirt.

Again.

To hide the absolute bubble of laughter that wanted to come out, stronger than usual thanks to her already strung out nerves, she pressed her lips together and scanned the area too. The tallest looking bush would probably come up to her knees. Other than that, there was the barely visible line of the nearby town on one horizon and the equally distant patch of woods they'd come through originally in the opposite direction. Feeling awkward, she started to squirm the littlest bit but the shift of her body in ways she wasn't used to put a stop to that fast.

It was Cloud. It was okay. He was her closest friend. They'd just - be adults about this.

Right?

"We could always –" she cleared her throat, determined to be sensible about this. Even if it was too late and she was determined to ignore the heat on her own cheeks. "Stand back to back?"

"Yeah."

Cloud nodded, not looking particularly happy about it but accepting that this was probably the best of all possible options, in spite of his continually withering pride. He had no reason to distrust Tifa (and certainly didn't), but he didn't have to enjoy being utterly humiliated in front of her (again), either. Much more of this, and he'd have to wonder whether some particularly belligerent misfortune was tied to the two of them, in specific...

"Let's get changed so we can get going."

If nothing else, he was starting to think even just giving in and crashing out on a nice, plush bed at the next town's inn would be a pretty good alternative to _this_. For a little while, maybe he could pretend it was all an unpleasant dream. Maybe it could even be slept off, like so many lesser ailments...

Well, it couldn't hurt to keep hoping.

(_Think positively... Right? ...Yeah, right._)

Grimacing a little as he turned to stand, Cloud waited until he thought Tifa wasn't looking (not willing to risk glancing, himself), before he started to undress. He didn't even want to look at his own hands - smaller, almost slender, but undoubtedly his, with all of the same scars and blemishes. It was just too weird.

As soon as he could, he was handing his pants back toward her, looking so hard into the distance that he was glaring out at nothing. It was bad enough that he could _feel_ the disturbing absence between his thighs. He _wasn't going to look_.

The skirt came off easy enough and Tifa as well had no desire to check and see what the spell had added to her body in that area. She could feel the addition enough as it was. A little bit lost as to what she was supposed to do about her underwear, she finally decided to leave it on, assuming that it... held things in place better...?

What was she going to do when she wanted a shower?

Or to use the bathroom?

Firmly clamping down on her lower lip to stop either the nervous giggle or the scream, she forcefully pushed that thought out of her head, slipping her bra off as well. Fumbling backward with a hand until she made contact with the fabric of Cloud's pants, she was careful to keep her hand wide to the side until she did. Despite the difference, they were still his hands, still warm and solid and so she stole a minute with the excuse of being sensible to hold on to his fingers while she traded out his pants and her skirt, passing the leather back to him and letting go.

Silent, she pulled on his pants, realizing that, in that area, she'd gotten the better deal since it wasn't as if she didn't wear pants from time to time regularly. The thick fabric helped with the... loose feeling and she made a soft noise of relief to herself. They fit all right in the waist - and were a little short in the legs. Pretending not to notice, she sat down once they were fastened and started to pull off her boots, shoving the bra into the pocket of the pants. Soft, to give him the 'all clear', still not looking behind her, she said:

"I'm okay." And then, after a moment, still quiet but with a weak twist of her lips, she added:_ "_I think I like you being the guy better though."

"...Me, too."

There was a bit of a delay in his perfectly sincere response, as he shifted uncomfortably in the borrowed skirt. It was different from wearing that dress, under which he'd been able to wear his own clothes - this way, he felt oddly exposed, unable to keep from fidgeting, tugging the short skirt down at the hem, as if concerned he might flash something unintentionally if he moved wrong. It was a snug fit, but had he been used to wearing such revealing clothing, Cloud probably would have even considered it comfortable.

Dragging a hand through his hair with a sigh, he clamped down hard again on all that unproductive thinking as he turned back to sit beside her. Shoes next. He could handle that, following suit without any fuss. Or not much, at least, as he cast a few fleeting, sidelong glances at her, still feeling the familiar strength in her grip, the same as ever, in those strange, outwardly sturdier hands.

And then, of course, he noticed the way the hem of his pants sat just a little too high around her ankles- Was she... Taller than him, too?

The miserable look on his face redoubled its presence. He was going to have inadequacy issues for the rest of his life.

Making his best effort not to look too put out as he pushed his too big set of boots over to her, he tried again to keep his mind on _productive _avenues of thought.

"Let's go on ahead to town by ourselves." ...He didn't think he had to explain why this had struck him as such a good idea. "If they don't have anything to fix this, there, I'll go out looking for another of those things, myself. You can stay at the inn, if it's more comfortable."

She used the boot trading as an excuse to shift a little closer to him. It didn't matter what he looked like, he still felt like Cloud and being able to be near him made things seem easier to take on. The move did have her curling her shoulders inward a little though and absently hunching to try to make herself smaller. She was really not enjoying being what, to her, registered as far too big. His suggestion had her jerking up entirely straight however and her brows came down fast over suddenly opal red specked eyes.

"No."

The response was immediate and firm, despite the fact her voice didn't actually rise. The look she sent him under her lowered brows was stubborn, a trait she usually tried to hide.

"No. We're a team. We do this together. I can still fight. I just have to get used to this body, that's all. I'll be fine."

First burst of reaction finished, her chin ducked and she hunched back into putting on his boot. She knew that he was just being thoughtful but it was more important to her that he understand they were in this together than that he was thoughtful. The look she shot him from under the tops of her eyes was still stubbornly reproving for even thinking she would.

"I'm not leaving you, Cloud."

He didn't mind the proximity, comforted at least marginally, in turn. Even the fact that she all but dwarfed him, now, didn't unsettle him any further than it had in deflating his ego ever further; Cloud knew he was short, and harbored no delusions, there, despite his unerring insecurity. But he also trusted Tifa not to rub it in - and not just because she was stuck in the opposite dilemma.

At her instant, brook-no-arguments denial of his earnest proposition, he was clearly taken aback... But probably shouldn't have been, too wrapped up in his own self-pity to think that she might have been just as willing to suffer the same embarrassment on his behalf.

You don't have to, he wanted to say, but there was no room for disagreement in the gravely sincere glare that she'd turned on him. All he could do was go silently back to lacing up her boots on his own feet, nodding his assent, no matter how reluctantly.

Once he was set, Cloud went to gather up his things, stuffing as much of his armor into his pack as he could (the belt ending up simply slung over a shoulder). He'd never get used to walking so carefully, but despite the incredible tide of awkwardness still threatening to sweep both him and his lingering sanity under, he mocked up something resembling an air of confidence before even so much as trying to speak up again.

...Woefully inadequate as any effort felt, wearing a borrowed skirt and a sword that definitely made him look tragically diminutive, now.

"We'd better get started, then." Embarrassment (not totally set) aside, he offered her a hand up.

No one ever asked her why she'd spent so many years training, why she'd bucked her own father and a small town in their idea of what a girl should act like to do it and so Tifa never told anyone that, somewhere along the way, waiting for her fairy tale story to come true, she'd stopped wanting to be the damsel in distress that didn't get saved until the end of the story and started wanting to be a part of the story instead and have her own adventures. It wasn't that she'd stopped wanting her hero to come - it was just that she had decided she wanted to go with him when he left this time. Wanted to be by his side and a help instead of somewhere safe and forever away.

Not that Cloud knew that and not as if she'd embarrass herself by telling him but she would go where he went as much as she could and suddenly being uncomfortably male didn't change that fact.

Even if it made it more awkward.

So, after stalling self-consciously over his boots at her outburst, looking up to find his offered hand, had both her miserable shoulders unknotting and the weak smile moving back to her lips. Her fingers wound through his and, if his were smaller and more slender than she was used to, the grip was the same and so was the feeling that went with it.

"Okay."

She couldn't resist giving his fingers a light squeeze before letting go and fitting her own pack across her shoulder once she was standing. Offering a small smile, she managed: "If we do run into another of those creatures once we've got this fixed - can we have Cid, Barret and Yuffie fight it? "

At the mental image of Cid and Barret as women (horrifying as the actual prospect was), Cloud couldn't hold back a snort of genuine laughter and another nod. Not at all ladylike.

"After this, we deserve to sit one out."

And maybe to spend a few days in really expensive therapy, too. He wasn't going to get over this one anytime soon - especially not if they got caught by anyone they knew before they'd managed to find a cure. Perhaps a little too eagerly, he turned toward the distant silhouette of civilization on the horizon, the little cluster of buildings that one could only fervently hope might prove their salvation.

...By the time they'd reached paved streets and the safe, warm glow of artificial light lining them, though, he wasn't feeling quite as adventurous. He'd earned a new appreciation for Tifa's tough optimism. How anybody could stay so upbeat with their legs so totally exposed to the elements - all biting insects and itchy grass and the occasional distracting breeze - was beyond him. Not to mention the unpleasant chafing provided by a top that was too tight in places he was trying his hardest not to acknowledge.

As he scanned the facades of quaint, crowded buildings around them, he couldn't keep from hoping that Inn would be the first sign they saw. ...With his current run of luck, today, though, that'd probably just jinx it.

Tifa meanwhile had to figure out how to walk. She wasn't used to having... something between her legs like that and that it moved as she did was even more disturbing. She told herself it was just like having a chest. She'd grown up into it and it must be the same for guys only... lower. It still made walking, especially at first, an experience and she hung back a few steps behind Cloud even once she had gotten a pattern down.

Cloud really did have nicely long legs. Even when he was a guy but the skirt just made it more noticeable. Watching him tromp though - it was a nice distraction from her own situation. Watching a girl tromp around in a mini-skirt... the humor of it helped her make it as far as the town without completely despairing so she held on to it as they finally reached the relative safety of the buildings.

It was late though. Well past nightfall and she frowned, wondering if any shops that sold remedies would even still be open.

"A hot bath..." She murmured it and even if she didn't get her own body back, she was still worn down enough that it sounded good anyway. Cloud had said inn after all. She fully supported his priorities. Getting off the street would be nice too. There weren't many people out at this hour but she still couldn't help but feel as if they were staring. From habit her hand went to tug at the hem of her skirt - and then remembered Cloud was the one wearing it. Redirecting, she nudged his shoulder lightly, hand shifting to indicate the larger building set a little to the side and behind a row of houses. It looked like an inn from there and she hoped they had food too.

He could have pushed himself farther, ignored his own distress easily, and gone on hunting even if every business in town had shut down for the night. But he wasn't about to do that to Tifa. A part of him still hoped she'd reconsider letting him go ahead on his own, if only to assuage his need to play hero, to avoid feeling further futile guilt over their predicament.

When he felt that hand bump his shoulder and subsequently turned to follow her direction to look toward potential reprieve for the night, though, that gloomy train of thought cut off rather abruptly. It _was _late. And he would have had to've been blind and deaf not to have taken notice of Tifa's almost painstakingly meticulous gait, even as she walked just behind him. He didn't need to ask her if she was all right - of course she wasn't. Neither one of them really was, like this. And he wasn't going to drag the day's ordeal out any longer than he absolutely had to.

"Yeah. Let's get some rest." And a decent meal, and a shower, and... "We'll look around more in the morning."

In as perfectly businesslike a fashion as he could still manage, Cloud changed course to head for the Inn that was hopefully an Inn - and for the first time that day, their luck paid off. One awkward, curt transaction, an unbearably long staircase, and a door most definitely locked behind them later, only the silence of a small, homey, two-bed room was left to oppress them.

The awkward transaction would have been a lot more awkward if Tifa had let Cloud be the one to pick up the pencil the clerk had 'accidentally' dropped. One discounted room and an 'accidentally' shattered pencil she'd returned to the desk later however and they were safely in a room that Tifa thought was easily the nicest room she'd ever seen. Because it wasn't Out There. And she'd much rather be In Here with Cloud. Even if they were a bit 'outside' of themselves.

Gentle her hand touched his shoulder, resting there briefly and her thumb rubbed lightly over a spot she knew he probably held tension in. She wouldn't ask him if he was okay because it was a silly question but she could softly offer, almost a bit wryly:

"I bet I can get the clerk to send up some food if you want to take the first shower."

Quick thinking, on her part, had probably saved someone a broken nose - true to form, Cloud had remained plainly oblivious throughout this exchange, showing only a muted sort of concern for the fate of the troublesome writing implement. (Maybe she just didn't know her strength in a man's body.)

A sigh slipped past his lips, too light a sound to have really come from him, as soon as the door was shut and the rest of their trouble left somewhere on the other side. Cloud couldn't remember ever having been happier to be surrounded by such mundane scenery, all pit stops after close calls and grueling battles in the past aside.

Already running down his jumbled mental list of matters left to attend to, he jumped when a hand dropped gingerly to his shoulder - there was not a part of him that wasn't carrying tension, then, but he did manage to relax marginally under that comforting touch.

"No, I'll take care of it. You should go first."

"It probably goes away once we've slept. Most effects do, right?" It was accompanied by a soft rub against the back of his shoulder, a little awkward for her because she was used to having a smaller hand but it was as much to comfort herself as for his sake. The touch of her fingers stayed light, the movements steady and slow. She thought she'd rather deal with the clerk than Cloud in his unsuspecting mini-skirt but she wasn't going to argue. He took care of her in tiny little ways she wasn't even sure he thought about - but she did. She noticed and thought about them. Still - she gave it another shot, hoping a little soft teasing would be okay.

"Besides, everyone knows girls take more time in the bathroom than boys. You go first so I don't make you wait."

"Right."

Enduring pessimistic streak aside, he couldn't fault her logic, having been hoping for exactly the same. With another of those short, sincere nods, he reached up to clasp a hand over hers - however briefly, before moving away toward the room's only other adjoining door, dropping the last of his extraneous personal effects on the way.

Before he disappeared into the momentary refuge of total privacy that the small inn bathroom would provide- A soft huff of sound that could just as easily have been another sigh as amusement escaped him, and he glanced back over a shoulder that was much too small to be his own.

"But isn't that supposed to be my line, now?"

She could understand if it was a sigh but she hoped there was at least a whisper of amusement in it as well. She didn't know how to make everything better but if she could make something difficult easier, if she could lighten a bit of the burden Cloud always so stubbornly tried to entirely shoulder, then she would count it as her quiet small triumphs. So her smile was softer and closer to the smiles that only he saw from her when she shook her head.

"You couldn't even if you tried."

"You're probably right." And maybe there was just the faintest flicker of a smile there in that last glimpse thrown back over his shoulder, as Cloud closed the door and dissolved back into the utter misery of fighting his way through mundane tasks in an unfamiliar body.

He threw his shirt over the mirror before he cold be duped into getting a good look at himself, and that helped a little- But until he'd managed to fumble through the intricate workings of the bath faucet, and the sound of the shower drowned out everything else, he was absolutely positive every bit of awkward clumsy noise he made was echoing far louder than it should've.

(_Just get in and get out. Don't think about it._)

Yeah, right. He could only hope Tifa wasn't having as much of a mental breakdown, in the other room. She had seemed to be holding it together better, anyway.

As situations went, this was closer to what Tifa could handle. She wasn't alone which was her own personal fear - and she had someone else to think about. So she could distract herself from having to think about her own problem.

Except now she was in an empty room wearing a man's body.

Uncomfortable, she rubbed her hands over her arms. Given the strange thickness of the arms it wasn't much help and she trapped her lower lip between her teeth and simple breathed through her mouth for a few quick inhales. She could do this. As bad things went... she'd been through worse. If she remembered that, she could do this. It would be okay come morning.

She really liked being a girl...

Especially these days.

So she could this. And tomorrow it would be nothing but an awkward, embarrassing memory she would only share with Cloud. Which was okay too.

But first she'd promised food and, not wanting Cloud to have to come out to an empty room, Tifa decided that manly lungs were just fine for letting herself out of the room and going to the top of the stairs, to yell down to the clerk she thought owed her one for only breaking his pencil…

Showering turned out to be far less of an ordeal than he'd expected, all things considered. It certainly helped that washing his hair proved no different than usual, and that that was about as thorough as he cared to be (compensating by spending a longer amount of time under water much hotter than what he preferred, and promising himself he'd scrub more than just his face and hands, next time). _Drying off _was the dilemma.

He was still damp and dripping and wearing a towel over the mess of blonde spikes atop his head when he reemerged, having stuffed himself as hastily back into his clothes as possible and not made any attempt to mask it. Looking a little disheveled was the least of his worries, anyway.

"Tifa? Bathroom's all yours..." Pulling the towel down out of his line of sight, Cloud took a suddenly curious look around.

(_Something smells good._)

"Food?"

There was something very satisfying about being intimidating. It wasn't something Tifa did often and when she did it was less a matter of actually saying anything as it was cracking knuckles and That Look. That Look had proved just as effective as ever nicely enough even with the slightly different face around the eyes and the clerk has been nice enough to run next door to the small restaurant that wasn't still open but wasn't exactly closed to late night hotel guests who weren't expecting too much variety. She had been very polite when she'd thanked him for the effort...

So they had food and it was warm and smelled good and that went a long way toward making her feel better. For a moment or two, she actually forgot her problem. Having to pick everything up with oversized hands reminded her quickly enough but she still felt better. When Cloud came out looking...

okay. He looked adorable. Really, really - seriously adorable. And she was pretty sure it wasn't entirely due to him being female. So she was already smiling when he noticed the food and his reaction made it easier to breathe, her face relaxing even more into the smile. She gave a soft 'mm' and a nod, pretty pleased with herself. Since there were no tables or chairs in the room she patted the bed next to her. She was going to have to help him with his hair first though. Not that he wasn't capable but - he couldn't keep looking so cute. So hair - then food - and then it could be her turn to deal with the shower.

"Perfect timing. It just got here."

Though undoubtedly he'd have looked awkward doing so even in his right body, Cloud took the invitation with only a cursory hesitation. He was tired, by every possible definition of the word, and it was more of a relief than he intended to let on just to feel the soft mattress sink beneath him as he took a seat beside Tifa. At a time like _this_, there was no ignoring the simple pleasures (without risking slipping further away from precarious sanity, at any rate).

With a last valiant attempt to squeeze the rest of the water from his hair, he let the towel fall around his shoulders and skipped straight to reaching for something to eat. Of course, he didn't see anything wrong with his present state - the danger of accidentally being too adorable naturally the furthest thing from his still male and often one-track mind.

"We're lucky anybody was still up." And with luck in such short order, lately, he really meant it, visibly impressed. "You didn't have to go to a lot of trouble, did you?

She shook her head with a smile and another soft sound but the praise secretly warmed her deep inside.

"The clerk was very helpful."

Waiting until he'd gotten his food, she shifted around on the bed, moving to kneel behind him. If the movements were a bit awkward, they were still getting closer to her natural ease of movement than they had been before. She relied on her body to do what she asked it to when she asked it to and that included knowing how it moved on her part. She wouldn't be much of a martial artist of she didn't. For a brief touch, she rested a hand on his shoulder as she moved so he'd know not to shift.

"Stay put. I'm going to fix your hair. You look like a baby chocobo." Taking the towel from his shoulders, she was intent on drying his hair better and then maybe seeing if she could stop at least a fraction of the 'cute' he had going on.

A cute Cloud was a dangerous Cloud and luckily he had no clue.

"You can keep eating. It'll only take a minute."

She wasn't exactly sure how his metabolism worked but she wasn't going to let him stay hungry a second longer than she had to. It also made her remember and so she offered softly:

"You can sleep in my pajamas tonight if you want. The shirt is big enough and the pants have a drawstring so if you leave it loose they shouldn't bother you when your body changes back while you're sleeping."

"He was?" A little surprising, given their welcome... "The way he was acting before, I thought he'd be just as happy to get rid of us. "

But it helped that he'd misinterpreted their host's suddenly unfriendly attitude as just that, rather than the fear of repercussion should he get _too _friendly. It really was a carefully cultivated obliviousness - two parts low self-esteem to one part genuine lack of personal awareness. The latter of which did him no favor, now.

...And the former took another hit at Tifa's offhand comment about his hair, as she shifted around to sit just behind him. He put up no more protest than to reluctantly nod his head, however; there was no hoping she hadn't heard the sound of him nearly choking somewhere just after "baby chocobo." How was he supposed to salvage his dignity from that?

Best just to concentrate on eating (he really was starving, even if he could've likely gone a great deal longer without, thanks to that SOLDIER stamina), lending half an ear to what she was saying (lest it prove further detriment to his confidence). Unfortunately for him, though, even passive conversation on their problematic situation seemed to actively be working against him keeping his cool.

(_Tifa's pajamas..._)

"Better not—" he said, just a little too hasty to put the notion aside with another shake of his head. "I mean, I can just sleep in my clothes. It's no problem."

At least it wouldn't be the first time - and he wouldn't have to imagine waking up looking the way he was supposed to while wearing... Yet another set of women's clothing. (Karma was never going to let that one go, was it?) "You shouldn't have to be uncomfortable because of me."

Careful not to get it in the way of his eating, Tifa draped the towel over his head and started to rub. She figured there was no reason to correct his assumptions about the clerk and she caught the choke over the 'chocobo' comment but didn't know what to say that wouldn't give away that it was actually a cute thing. Not that he, as a man, would appreciate being called 'cute' or understand that it could be entirely masculine and pretty devastating without taking a fraction away from the handsome and male attributes. Cloud did it sometimes when his eyes went 'little boy'. If he ever found out what using those eyes on her did to her she was never going to be able to tell him 'no' about anything ever again. ...as if she didn't have a hard enough time telling him 'no' already.

"I'm not – "

She cut herself off. _'Aerith... I'm not Aerith.'_ Not soft and flirty and feminine, fit for lace and pink and flowers. Her pajamas were new. They hadn't had anything escaping Midgar and Aerith had pulled her into shopping when they'd been in Kalm. Her pajamas were just a soft, durable blue, lacking embroidered flowers or fuzzy bunnies or whatever it was that most women were used to. She'd grown up around boys, lived all her life surrounded by males and there were certain traits of being a girl that she knew she just - missed. Like turning down the silk robe Aerith had tried to convince her to buy. She'd wanted it. Thought it looked beautiful and loved the way it felt against her skin and how soft it made her feel... but it would have taken up room in the limited carry space of her pack and so she'd bought herself brass knuckles instead.

"They're not girly." H_er _fingers rubbed through his hair, as much scalp massage as to dry the hair there. Through the towel she didn't have to feel self-conscious about the way fingers that weren't hers would feel to him._ "_I can wear the pants and give you back yours. But the top is loose enough that your... top wouldn't feel... wouldn't be uncomfortable rubbing against anything."

She was wincing at herself as she finished that failure of an offer but his newly grown chest was pushing pretty obviously against the front of his shirt and she knew how she would feel if it was her. She wasn't going to commit the mortal sin of offering him one of her bras instead. Gentle she draped the towel back over his shoulders and then went to work on his hair, using her admittedly short nails to begin combing through it, letting them drag just a little over his scalp as she did because she knew how much she liked it when someone did that to her. Quiet, she added:

"I'm not. Uncomfortable." Concentrating on his hair and not having to see his eyes, she could confess it._ "_I mean, I am but it's easier because you're here. You make it better, not worse. ...I always feel braver when you're nearby."

"That's not—" He shook his head, too aware of the warmth spreading through the sensitive skin under mussed blonde hair wherever those strong hands massaged. "...I mean, that's not what I meant. "

Well, it sort of had been - but the risk of ending up in something frilly for the sake of coping with a situation that was already so unbelievably ridiculous was only the half of it. The rest was far more embarrassing than that, nearly as mortifying as her attempt to elaborate on a perfectly well-founded justification for offering, in the first place.

He sank just a little farther in on himself under her hands, as if wishing it away hard enough could possibly resolve the trouble he was having with his totally backward body. He didn't want to wear Tifa's clothes not because they might have potentially been _girly_, but because they were _Tifa's_. They'd be soft, because she had slept in them every night since Kalm, and maybe that familiar scent of perfume or deodorant (given her nature, he should've suspected the latter, but Cloud wasn't the presumptuous type) that he sometimes caught just a hint of when she was close clung to them, too-

And sometimes simply sleeping next to her was distraction enough, but to be completely, inescapably surrounded by her? Even the discomfort the chafing fabric of his uniform top caused would be easier to rest with.

He was about to say something (not that, not any of that, but something), when she spoke up again, too abrupt, too honest for him to interrupt.

For one impossibly long moment, Cloud was silent, not moving or saying anything - until he turned, shifting where he sat just enough to look at her, sincerity enough in his expression to make him look all of fifteen again. His skin still tingled where she'd run her fingers through his hair, and his face felt uncomfortably flushed, but for the first time since they'd run across the inconvenient beast that had launched them into their current crisis, he felt like _himself_, too.

"...Thanks." He ducked his head, unable to stretch that last waning bit of confidence much further. "It's... Not as bad with you around, either. I wouldn't want to deal with this alone. Or with the others...

Her eyebrows had gone up the smallest bit, waiting to find out what reason there could be other than 'girly' that he wouldn't want her pajamas. She couldn't think of anything though and she usually prided herself on being able to anticipate other people's needs and having whatever it was already waiting for them when they realized it. Was he afraid they might not fit when he grew? She bought her sleep shirts extra-large for a reason...

His shift on the bed though had her full attention and her hands dropped to her lap as he fixed those impossible blue eyes on her. Male or female face, his eyes were still the same and they did the same thing they always did to her when they focused on her, just her, so completely. Her stomach took that strange little flip and the very tips of her fingers went fuzzy feeling and tingly. His 'thanks' had the weak smile surfacing though, softening the edges of her eyes too. The confession that followed afterward though...

_...oh..._

Tifa had the ability to make herself startlingly small and having a larger body didn't seem to change that trait at all. She folded forward into herself - and just her forehead found his shoulder. It wasn't a hug because she didn't like this body and because even if she was in her own she wasn't sure she'd be brave enough to do that even as a friend to him when he wasn't having one of his fits - she didn't want to crowd him or make him uncomfortable -

but it was the full equivalent of a hug in intent.

It left her long hair down across his arm and hid most of the rest of her body from him. It would have been hard for Cloud to have found words that would have meant more to her. The nod against his shoulder was small and her voice was a whisper.

"I'm glad."

Without any of his usual hesitance, Cloud reached over to press a comforting hand to her shoulder. And maybe it ruined the gesture, making it so obvious again (at least to him) that there was something very wrong, here - his hand looked just about as small as she seemed to feel, lifting the illusion of normalcy that the dark veil of her hair almost cast. But he could think of no better, no more adequate response, and that closeness demanded _something _of him, after all.

It was only the fear of screwing things up that tried to hinder him, still, but with little success. Even though it should only have added to the weight of the world resting so heavily on his shoulders, her confidence always left him feeling oddly lighter at heart. Even at the worst of times...

Which he had to remind himself weren't now, weren't this, feeling foolish for even finding the comparison.

"Things'll be better, tomorrow. Let's just get through tonight."

It was still his touch. Whether his hand was smaller and softer than usual or not, it was still Cloud and the warmth of his skin and familiar. So, eyes still closed for a minute, she nodded against his shoulder the smallest bit. He was right. Tomorrow would be better and they had each other until then. Pulling in a long breath, she straightened again and gave him a small smile, feeling better after this brief respite. She still scooted closer as she got her own food and started eating. Food, shower, bed - and tomorrow would be better.

She did worry though. She had a nightly habit everyone had gotten used to her doing when they were apart - and tonight she just didn't think she could handle it.

"You don't think anyone will worry, do you? If I don't call and check on them?"

"I'll call them." He volunteered, turning back to his own meal as casually as he could. It would be much easier to mask the change in his own voice while still managing to sound at least a little nonchalant than it would be for Tifa to try the same, at any rate. Maybe they wouldn't ask (too many) questions of him.

He did feel a little bad for having made such an abrupt and unannounced break from the group, anyway. Usually the reasons they split up were far less superficial - not that he could regret the decision, so long as he was capable of imagining the awkward hell it would've been to spend the night amongst everyone, looking like he did.

"We'll just... Have to think up a good excuse for why we left." Not that he _really_ thought for a second that even the most convincing argument for their position would stop the rest of them from coming to their own conclusions.

She watched him volunteer and there was a part of her that simply wanted to let him shoulder the problem alone and do the phone call. That wasn't fair though and at the end of the day, she knew that she'd be teased less, however good-naturedly they did it, than he would. Still, brows down, she thoughtfully chewed her food before answering.

She'd be upset if someone else wandered off and didn't touch base with the rest of the team. She didn't want to worry anyone. That said, there wasn't a single part of her that felt the least bit guilty for hiding their situation. Thought outright lying made her feel uncomfortable but - if it kept everyone from worrying it was okay then. Right? Light, her fingertips touched his arm.

"If your voice sounds a little different we can always blame it on getting hit with an effect. Everyone's voice sounds strange when they're still recovering from being hit with Mini."

Mind still hung up on voices, it didn't occur to her that there were any conclusions for the others to come to in the first place regarding the two of them disappearing together for the night. She offered him a small, crooked smile and tried for humor as she said: "You can say I got transformed and we ran out of Kisses so you decided to stop until I finished hopping around. I'll leave the Transform on my glove so no one wonders why you didn't use it."

Tifa was usually better at simply denying things or not volunteering them than she was at outright lying. Except she had been a part of AVALANCHE for long enough to have at least some experience with alibis.

"That should work."

It'd have to - Cloud didn't think himself the most convincing liar, either (though on his part it was mostly a lack of creativity), and coming up with something better was beyond his expertise. As embarrassing as it was to be struck with a Mini spell, he could live with that kind of ridicule. They'd all had it happen once or twice, and nobody could get too smart about something like that, at least.

And nobody'd gone without being Frog Jabbed a time or two, either, though it wouldn't keep him from feeling a bit guilty, lumping some of the blame for their abrupt detour on Tifa's imagined status. As long as they stuck to the story, however, their alibi would be airtight that way, and nobody else would _ever _have to know. (Still paltry reassurance in the face of their reality, but something he couldn't help rethinking for even that tiny consolation.)

Either full or having lost his appetite at the current topic, Cloud pushed his plate away and rose to his feet.

"Yeah. As long as we say it happened like that... Nobody should doubt us." Going to his pack again to dig out his PHS, he cast a somewhat apologetic look back to Tifa as he retrieved the phone. As awkward as this was going to be, he hoped she'd understand if he didn't exactly want an audience - and he couldn't continue to hog the bathroom, which meant heading outside the inn.

(_Better get this over with..._)

"I'll be right back."

Tifa understood but she hesitated before nodding. The clerk was still out there. She was pretty sure that she'd driven the point of leaving Cloud alone home but... some guys could be amazingly persistent. If Cloud went outside though she could both finish scarfing down her meal and hopefully get her shower in or at least start to before he got back. The sooner they went to sleep, the sooner they could wake up with all of this behind them.

"Cloud - keep your knees together. If you sit down."

Awkwardly aware of the flush across her cheeks, she went back to her meal, concentrating on it to give him the privacy to deal with the new information. She only let herself cringe after he left and then she hurriedly finished her dinner, setting his pointedly on the nighttable next to the bed before rinsing off her own dishes in the sink.

Then she dug out her pajamas and toothbrush. She debated leaving the top for him but decided not to push the issue. She turned down the covers on their beds... and finally shook her head at herself with a frown for stalling and headed to the bathroom for her shower. It was time to deal with the situation.

It was good advice. Concise. Practical.

And completely horrifying.

Cloud's only saving grace was that his back was already turned when she'd said it (_keep your knees together_), as he most certainly did not wait until he was on the other side of the door to grimace. He could feel the heat rising just under his skin and was probably miserably beet red the whole, shameful walk down and out through the inn's lobby. If the man at the front desk called anything out to him in passing, he didn't hear it, fortunate, for once, to have a one-track mind. Checking in with the others was the only thing he wanted to think about - finishing the evening's last errand, and then trying to sleep this whole mess off.

Outside, the streets were mercifully deserted, and he could almost breathe easy where he slumped back against the inn's outer wall, hidden in the shadows just around the corner. Even if there was no one around, he couldn't help being just a little paranoid. (It was totally justified.)

Just one phone call, and then both of their consciences would be clear. ...Except it ended up being two awkward calls, to check in with two separate factions - both of which asked entirely too many questions of the simple, straightforward cover story Tifa had concocted for them.

(It hadn't helped that Yuffie and Cait Sith had both been chattering away eagerly on the other end of each call, both as nosy as ever. Not to mention Aerith's polite worrying and Barret's personal offense at the two of them taking off together.)

With a sigh that was far wearier than it had any right to be, coming from a man his age, Cloud went to stuff the PHS back into his pocket... Before belatedly realizing that he didn't have any pockets, there, anymore. For the second time that night, he hoped Tifa was handling the situation at least a little better than he was - though this time, maybe, it wasn't entirely without a touch of (dry, self-deprecating) amusement. Yeah, he'd definitely started to lose it.

Shaking his head dismissively at some hopeful-sounding invitation from the clerk (again, not listening, the poor man), he cut back through the lobby and made his way back up to the room. He was quiet, coming back in, not looking to startle Tifa, if she was still busy in the other room.

Maybe heading to bed without saying much more would be for the best...

Tifa had braced herself for this but catching sight of herself in the mirror over the sink as she closed the bathroom door had her stomach dropping unpleasantly. Hesitant, as if Cloud's boots weighed more than they did, she moved over to the mirror and stared at the face in it. The hugely horrified eyes were the same - and nothing else was. Careful, almost afraid, she touched her nose. Her chin. Pushed almost forcefully at her cheek. They were hers. The sense of feeling told her so. But the cheek and the fingers refused to look the way they should. Her throat went tight and her eyes stung but she swallowed and pushed away from the sink, dropping down without her usual grace to sit on the lid of the toilet. Concentrating as if it would save her life, she began unzipping Cloud's boots.

She could do this. She could do this. It was only for a little while longer and falling apart wasn't going to help any. Blinking hard and sniffing to clear her nose, she gently set Cloud's boots down near the sink, socks neatly folded on top and tried to distract herself.

If she'd had a brother, is this what he would look like? She'd always wanted a brother or a sister. Especially after mama had died. It had been lonely in that big, usually empty house.

If she'd - if she'd been born male was this what she would have looked like? She stripped off her gloves and set them neatly on the lip of the sink. The armlet with its materia stayed on. Even showering she never took it off. Would she have left town like the rest of the boys if she'd been a guy?

Would she have gone with Cloud to join SOLDIER?

The leather arm sleeves came off next as well as the elbow guard. Absent her hand traced over the fabric of her shirt, following a scar it hid that she'd always thought she was the only one that knew about.

Would she have been strong enough to stop Sephiroth - if she'd been a guy...?

she'd been so useless that night...

The shirt came off and the scar was still there even if she didn't recognize the chest it was marking. Male or female, she'd only been fifteen.

But fifteen year olds had fought in the Wutai war. Cloud had been SOLDIER at sixteen. Or so he said. Her teeth worked at her lower lip and she let the old worry distract her while she stood up and tried not to think about it as she unfastened the pants and slipped them off. Except Cloud hadn't been in Nibelheim. He hadn't been one of the SOLDIER to come. She knew. She knew. Because she remembered how heartbroken she'd been.

So how did he know about it? The details that no one alive but her should know? Even Zangan hadn't been there for some of the things Cloud remembered. Only someone that had been there would know.

The speculation got her all the way to the part where she was naked and standing in the shower with the water running. Then it failed her entirely and left her with nothing but herself. Against her better judgment, she looked down.

Huge, her eyes snapped back up and red washed all the way down to her chest. This was the closest she'd ever been to an education about a man's body and she was pretty sure tonight's lesson was over. Grabbing the soap, she went with the 'make enough suds to trickle down and handle places I don't want to reach' theory. Washing her chest felt strange enough and leaning down to get her feet she wondered how Cloud -

_**NO!**_ No she was not going to let her mind wander to thoughts of Cloud in his normal body and washing habits. The tips of her ears were already burning and, brows down, she focused hard on washing out her hair. Hoping she'd rinsed off well enough, she was out of the shower in record time, dealing with the logistics of drying what she didn't want to touch and in the pajamas that fit awkwardly in no time flat. Teeth brushed and a towel over her shoulder as she stepped out of the room with their collected gear, she hoped she wasn't too red in the face. Concentrating on what was in her arms, she held out his pants, aware of Cloud without having to look. Her voice was still a sincere murmur:

"Thank you."

The shower must've been worse for her than it'd been for him.

_And why shouldn't it have been? _his rational mind asked. As weird as it was dealing with his own unwanted additions, personal experience dictated that hers was undoubtedly the far more difficult to adjust to. She couldn't just... And whenever she had to...

No, no no no, he didn't want to think about that. Not anymore than Tifa did, herself, he was certain. So he took his pants back, nodding to that impossibly meek little thanks as he did, and decided (probably not for the last time, even yet) just not to ask. The last leg of the night was liable to be the worst, still, but once the lights were out and he was alone with his miserable thoughts, there'd be no more unexpected unpleasantness.

He _hoped._

"The others are all right." An abrupt, clumsy conversation starter, as he went to sit on the edge of the bed nearest to him. He could pull on his pants under her borrowed skirt, and then return it to her, no fuss, he thought. (Though he still sat facing away, for propriety's sake, anyway.) "...Energetic as usual. But I don't think they'll give us any grief."

Clumsy it might have been but it was a lifeline to her and Tifa caught his topic of conversation desperately. She hadn't expected anyone else to have gotten into trouble but the reassurance that things were fine still had her pulling in an easier breath than she realized she had before.

There was also no way, if they'd run into the same effect she and Cloud had, that the rest of the team wouldn't have known what was going on with them. Cloud's lack of mention of that meant they were in the clear.

Just as long as no one else ran into one of those creatures and got turned.

Deciding to worry about that when and if it happened and not before she scooted over to the bed next to Cloud's and set her gear down next to her pack. Cloud's boots got gently set next to his bed and she keep her eyes on what she was doing while he changed despite the mattress in between them and probably only his back and hair being visible. Digging out her hairbrush to being the soothing routine of brushing out her hair as she sat on the edge of her own bed, she hummed a soft sound. Pausing a beat, she offered:

"Vincent _is_ usually pretty excitable at this time of the night."

The unexpected snort of laughter her casual comment startled out of him caught even Cloud by surprise, and the skirt caught up around his ankles. Once he'd freed himself, his head shaking still in that same muted amusement, he tossed the offending article onto the bed behind him, feeling almost comfortable, back in his own, familiar uniform.

"Sure. I bet he's just bouncing off the walls."

Maybe a few minutes of just not dwelling on it wouldn't hurt, before they both settled in to what would surely be a fitful sleep. While Tifa brushed her hair carefully out, Cloud just combed his fingers through his own a few times, letting it fall back into its usual disarray as he hoisted himself up only to flop over onto his back on his bed.

A casual enough move, but one he regretted almost immediately - it felt strange, in this body, especially with his hands behind his head. But he wouldn't start moving around and draw further attention to himself, with that last, infinitesimal sliver of leftover pride he was still clinging to at stake.

In the little mental tally Tifa kept in her head, she chalked up another one of those golden, delighted points at the sound Cloud made and her own lips curved in pleasure, quietly pleased with herself. Maybe it was just a silly little conversation but she hoarded it away in her memories.

Things weren't all bad.

Finishing brushing her hair out, she left it loose around her, feeling better both from the brushing and the humor. Shaking her head as she made a 'tsk'ing sound, she shifted over on her own bed, crawling under the covers and curling on her side to face him, pillow as much something she was hugging as resting her head on.

"It's the sugar," her voice was a soft murmur._ "_They really shouldn't let him have sugar this close to bedtime."

"Right, right. "

Despite his best efforts to the contrary, it was impossible to quell the slightest sliver of a smile, there and gone, where he lie patiently facing the ceiling, still. A disastrous day was finally ending, and in the morning, all of this would be one unpleasant, inconsequential memory. He closed his eyes, almost willing himself to drift off right then and there. Not that it would ever be that easy...

When she spoke like that, he could almost hear her real voice in it, could relax just a fraction and imagine her as she was supposed to be, lying in her own bed, just across from him. Not a bad thought.

"I almost feel sorry for Barret. Without you around to keep everyone in line, it's probably chaos."

Even lumpy in the wrong places, it was still reassuring to be able to watch him on the bed nearby. Cloud was Cloud - and she just found it easier to deal with things when he was nearby. So she caught the barely there smile just before it vanished and it made her own lips soften and curve in response. With a soft sound, she burrowed her chin a little more into the pillow, wine colored eyes watching him over the top of it.

Would it be easier if she turned off the lamp though? Maybe not being able to see themselves in the dark would make it easier to pretend they weren't changed, make it easier to fall asleep. Except - she wasn't sure the dark wouldn't just magnify things instead, the way laying there in the dark so often seemed to. At least this way, all she had to do was open her eyes to know that she wasn't alone. She decided that if Cloud wanted the light off, he'd take care of it himself and until than she got to start to relax like this. Emotionally, she was ready for sleep.

"I'm sure he's fine. And tomorrow when we get back, I'll sit on Yuffie so that you can get all our materia back from her."

He made no qualm about the light; but being able to see as well as he could in the dark, it wouldn't have made much difference to him, one way or the other. Not to mention he'd the innate ability to sleep just about anywhere, under just about any condition - but a little bit of military service went a long way, in that regard. You either learned to get rest where and when you could, or you went without.

Besides - any unnecessary motion would only serve to remind him of the sorry state they were both in, and as it was, Cloud fully intended to stay perfectly still until morning. He'd managed the feat once or twice in the past, at any rate.

"You don't think she'll take off with all of it again, do you? I thought we were past that..."

Her lips curved again and she shut her eyes for a moment. Even if the situation was terrible it was kind of nice to be able to be like this, just the two of them. He was her childhood friend but so much more than that, on this journey, he'd simply become her friend. All the other emotions she had tangled up around him...? That he was her friend was the singular unconfusing part. And it was nice to be able to be here with him and not having to pretend. The sound she made was voiceless.

"No. She'll stay. But she wouldn't be Yuffie if she didn't take advantage of materia when it was available. She knows she'll get caught but that's not the point."

Slow, her eyes opened and she looked at him again over the top of her pillow. She'd watched him often enough to know even he didn't usually lay that still. Quiet, she offered:

"I can hit you with Sleepel if you want. There's no reason you should have to stay awake all night long."

"That's okay." Automatically, he shook his head, reaching up a second later to brush his bangs out of his face. As tempting as the offer of instant unconsciousness might have been, he didn't want to take the risk of being caught totally unaware by any precipitant weirdness to their current situation. Especially not when it was just the two of them, no instant backup with the others camping out for the night.

The risk wouldn't have been worth it, just to be knocked out for a while. He was tired enough that he thought he could catch at least a few decent hours, on his own, anyway.

"What about you? Are you gonna be able to fall asleep..." He shifted where he lay, as if trying to relax a little further, cracking open his eyes but not looking around. "...Like that?"

She made a noise as she buried her face in the pillow that might have been a snort. Or a choke. Either way, her voice came back muffled.

"The sooner I fall asleep, the sooner I can wake up looking like me again."

There was a sigh as she readjusted her head, and her hold, on the pillow. As substitutes went, the pillow was trying its hardest. She suddenly missed being able to snuggle her back against one of the other girls or Red though. After a minute, one eye peering over the white mound, she admitted as if she was worried it would sound offensive:

"I don't think I like me being a guy."

"It's just... Weird, because we're not used to it."

Though even an earnest attempt to dismiss her concern came out sounding faulty, when what he really wanted to do was just to agree. Cloud couldn't say he cared much for himself as a girl, either - certain misadventures in the not-quite-past-_enough _past had made him sure of that well before her cautious profession, now.

But he wasn't going to start reminiscing about _that_, now, as hard as he'd avoided making any comparisons, yet, today. Casting a sidelong glance at the wrong-shaped Tifa in the periphery of his vision, Cloud frowned in a way that felt more awkward than stoic, even just to him.

"I dunno. You'd probably make an okay guy..."

Under the blankets her shoulders hunched and she buried her face a bit more in the pillow again, eyes closing. Having half a sneaking suspicion that Cloud saw her as 'one of the guys' anyway, she really didn't like this only serving to drive the point home. And she really didn't like not being able to shift her legs without being reminded of just how much of a guy's body she was stuck with at the moment. Sleep - and tomorrow - couldn't come fast enough and if she was still male then...

no. No, she didn't think she could think about that right now and not end up miserable.

And maybe a little panicky.

So instead she shifted her focus to Cloud and him being a girl. A much prettier girl than he'd been the last time he'd tried. At least this time his chest didn't make crinkling noises when he moved wrong... the thought had her lips twitching in the pillow and she made a soft sound before lifting her head enough to look at him, only her eyes visible over the pillow.

"Well, you make a terrible girl," she muttered. "You trudge _everywhere_.

"H-Hey-!"

Cloud sat up abruptly, shooting her an offended look - one that wilted as soon as he realized what he was doing. Maybe his pride had been even more deeply wounded than he'd thought, if he'd seriously considered _that _point one worth arguing.

It was true, anyway. Thinking back, he'd been pretty rough on her borrowed boots, probably stomping the whole way to the inn without noticing. Trying to look casual walking in a totally unfamiliar body had been chore enough, alone, though. He couldn't be expected to moderate the force with which he did so, as well, now could he?

"Well, whatever." Dropping back to the mattress with a frown that was only slightly exaggerated, he sighed and shut his eyes (perhaps a tad defensively) again. "I won't be one for much longer, with any luck."

It was stifled, both by the pillow and by the fact that Tifa usually tried to stifle it anyway - and it was a little broken - but there was no mistaking the very rare sound of Tifa. Giggling.

It didn't last long but even when it was done the bubbles of it were still in her eyes. Feeling more comfortable than she had since this had all started, she gathered up her pillow, slipped out of her bed and padded on bare feet over to his. She wouldn't have tried it if things had been normal - but they weren't normal and right now she just wanted to be close to the comfort of his familiarity.

"Scoot over?"

"Huh?"

Still pretty sore from the sound of her snickering at him (much as he thought he wouldn't mind hearing that laugh more often, he didn't want to be the one being laughed _at_), if took him a moment to realize what she was asking. Of course, sitting up and opening his eyes once more to see that she was standing at the edge of his bed helped run the point home, in that respect, considerably.

Before he could stop to give her request any real thought, he found himself simply agreeing, instead-

"Oh. Yeah. "

-and making a graceless sideways shuffle across the rumpled comforter to the other side of the bed.

"Thank you." She whispered it as she crawled onto the bed next to him and lay down on her back, pillow wrapped in her arms over her chest. Even if her body didn't fit right, old habit still had her head at about where his shoulder height had been when he'd been laying down. Closing her eyes and exhaling she found that - finally - things felt right. Not entirely but it was easier to ignore what was wrong at least. After a moment, as if in apology for either giggling or perhaps for invading his space, she softly confessed:

"I always liked being a girl when I was growing up. I liked wearing dresses and pretty hats. I liked being the only girl. Until you left. That was when I realized that boys got to go have adventures and girls got left behind."

Wrapping her arms a little more around the pillow she pressed down into the mattress a bit more.

"That's why I trained with Master Zangan. So I'd never have to be left behind again."

For a long while (the sort that always felt far longer than it actually was), Cloud was silent, turning those words over in his mind. He'd never once thought- No, he'd had a head too full of his own childish ambitions to have considered for one second what it might've meant to anyone else that he had just up and left town - just like the rest of them, he'd already been imagining himself in an ideal future, leaving the present and all those still hopelessly trapped in it in the dust.

He'd just wanted to be someone, to make something of himself so desperately...

Like every other time he'd tried to think too hard on the past, lately, the effort only left him feeling empty and headachey all over again, and he had to throw in the towel before he started to upset her further. He really would be up all night, if he pushed it - and then where would they be?

Sliding a hand under the back of his neck, he glanced down at her from where he lay, propped up just slightly by his own pillow. From this angle it was awkward, talking down to the top of her head, but still he managed to sound as sincere as he felt when he said:

"...Sorry."

(_For everything that's happened since then..._)

"But... We're all in this together, now. _Nobody_ gets left behind, anymore."

She didn't mind the silence with Cloud, comfortable in it, and she was already starting to breathe deeper when he spoke again. Her eyes flickered open and she tried to tip her head to look at him. The angle was awkward though so she rolled over onto her side facing him instead, still careful not to crowd him or take up any of his space as she cuddled back into the pillow, knees tucking up slightly. She only grimaced a little when she did that. And she shook her head.

"Don't be sorry. I wouldn't have started to dream for myself if you hadn't dreamed first and shared it with me."

Careful of the new curves on his body, her own hand went searching for his free one, curling carefully when she found it. He'd had to leave. She'd known that. And she'd been proud. And sad. And a hundred other things. But if he hadn't gone... if he hadn't gone he might have been one of those sliced open or burning corpses she still saw in her dreams at night sometimes. So she was glad he'd been away.

Except he said he hadn't. And she still didn't understand how he knew what he did about that night...

Eyes lifted to his under her bangs and the smile she gave him was soft but it filled her eyes too. Soothing, her thumb rubbed over the back of his hand.

"That's right. We're a team." For just a moment, the edge of her lips quirked upward and her eyes crinkled at their edges._ "_And we always come back to each other, even if sometimes some of us have to sneak away for a bit because of cosmetic problems."

She was always much better with words than he'd ever been - so maybe it was a good thing she didn't mind his silence, so often as he was left struck to differing degrees of speechlessness by something she'd said. Whether it was guilty or embarrassed or just plain dumbfounded, she only rarely ever seemed irritated with him for being so quiet. Just entirely too patient.

With everything about him, actually. His faulty memory, his bad attitude, the whole mess he'd managed somehow to sweep the lot of them into... With a little more self-awareness, he could have been properly embarrassed. But as he was, it was simply baffling.

As she wrapped her hand around his, Cloud returned the gesture just as carefully, thinking only of the well-meaning behind it - and not the weird way it felt to have a hand smaller, narrower than hers. (Well, okay, he just didn't think about that _too much_.)

"Right. ...Completely legitimate cosmetic problems."

"Mm." She gave a small nod against her pillow, lips still smiling at their edges and closed her eyes again. It had been a long day before they'd run into their sex changing nemesis and for the first time Tifa felt safe and relaxed enough to feel it catching up to her. Once again, out of everyone this could have happened to her with, she was glad it was Cloud. He made her feel safe. Hand still safely twined with his, she nestled down deeper into the pillow with a quiet sound, more than willing to let the sleep come now. She was ready to be a girl again.

And yet... she was glad this had happened. Selfish and feeling guilty for it, she was still glad for this time alone with Cloud, glad to have him all to herself for just a little while...

"Tomorrow," she murmured it._ "_I'm going to buy the girliest dress I can find." A long, drowsy exhale later, common sense had her amending._ "_Or a new hair ribbon."

"Hmph..."

Nothing but a distantly amused huff of breath came in response. Even had he not been feeling the soft pressure of real drowsiness behind his own eyes as he leaned back, resting silently once again, he might've been wise enough to keep his mouth shut on that point, though. Whether or not they turned up in their proper forms in the morning, they had already made plans to visit the shops first thing - he wouldn't protest.

And it was with this thought in mind that he drifted off, falling into a sleep he'd expected to find it nigh impossible to catch, with the way things were. Not to mention the added edge of anxiety in Tifa sharing half the bed, in knowing she was there, even though it was completely innocent. Maybe it wasn't the first time they'd ended up sleeping in close confines, but every other time, he'd slept tense, too, cautious even in unconsciousness.

By some miracle, however, that light, fitful rest lasted on into daylight, when Cloud woke reluctantly, shaking his head to dispel that groggy feeling... And then taking a nasty start when those precious few seconds of worry-free thoughtlessness left him behind, and he remembered just where he was and what was up.

His eyes flew open and his hands went straight to his chest - and an instant, impossible wave of relief crashed over him as he found it mercifully flat, perfectly ordinary. He wanted to jump up out of bed and run to wake-

(_Oh. Right._)

There _was _something weighing him down, yet. He winced as he lifted his head to look, seeing himself in his own body, and...

"...Tifa?"

"Mnh." The sound was mumbled. During the night Tifa's body had shifted just the way Cloud's had, returning to its natural softer curves and slimmer limbs. Even asleep she'd lost the tension she'd been holding once it had happened. Now, soft and relaxed, she hid her face and snuggled down, slender fingers tangling in the fabric covering her pillow. A pillow she'd apparently upgraded to during the night because the down one she'd been hugging earlier was on the floor and she now had her face pressed into the fabric of Cloud's shirt just about at rib level, hand curled in the fabric over the flat planes of his stomach. And from the way her breathing immediately deepened again after her single muffled noise, she was very content to sleep the rest of the morning away that way too. Lacking a blanket, she'd found her warmth a different way and, sound asleep, apparently considered it satisfactory.

(_Oh, man._)

She wasn't waking up. In fact, she didn't appear to have been disturbed by his movement at all, which brought about a new dilemma. Did he make another attempt to wake her deliberately? Or try to make it look unintentional? Or would it have been better just to wait this out?

There definitely wasn't any precedent for handling _this _type of situation in his (admittedly limited) recollection; much as he didn't want to upset her by going about this in the most awkward fashion imaginable, though, he didn't want to embarrass her that badly, either. And letting it go on too long definitely had the potential to get embarrassing.

There, that decided it, then. It was obviously just an unconscious mistake - anybody could've made it (a thought he immediately regretted having, as it prompted a nice little imaginary slideshow in his mind of alternate possibilities and _that kind of thing wasn't helping_).

Reaching out to take hold of her shoulder, he gave her one very gentle shake.

"Hey, uh- Tifa?"

Usually Tifa was a quick riser. Whether it was up at the crack of dawn to make breakfast or in the dead of night for a watch, if she didn't wake up on her own all it took was the whisper of her name to have her shaking herself awake.

Usually.

Usually she wasn't curled up in the perfect spot, right where she let herself sometime pretend she was to help her fall asleep on particularly bad nights. Usually she wasn't the perfect degree of warm and surrounded so completely by a smell she associated with safety and belonging and need. Usually she was subconsciously aware of other people, and one girl in particular, being nearby.

This morning was not usually.

But it was Cloud calling her and even asleep she couldn't not answer when he called for her. So her 'pillow' got a nuzzle and her body tucked in closer against it but Cloud's voice got the hazy response of:

"Mm?"

This was just gonna keep getting worse for him, wasn't it? Cloud dropped back to the bed in an only mildly frustrated huff; she was... kind of cute like that, too, even if it was a little inconvenient. There were worse ways to end up stuck-

But that wasn't any kind of excuse to drag this out. Steeling himself once again, he lifted the same hand, reached for her shoulder - hesitated, and then found the resolve somewhere to give her another cautious shake.

"...Tifa, hey. Wake up. We're, y'know... Normal, again."

_(__And you're kinda on top of me.__)_

She inhaled, the first sign that she was going to relinquish the very pleasant sleep she'd been tucked into and turned her face into the pillow completely, fingers kneading against fabric in unconscious preparation for the day.

Normal.

They were... normal. Again.

Mind not fond of giving her bad news first thing in the morning, it took a while for why that meant anything to penetrate the gray haze over her thought process. When it did though, it jerked her awake, a literal twitch through her body as it registered.

They were normal again.

Her head came up, sleep tousled hair over one of her eyes and that single wine colored point focused on the face in front of her.

Cloud...

It pulled out the slightly hazy, soft smile even before she registered that he was, indeed, wearing the male version of his face again, complete with stubborn chin and pale, stubborn eyebrows. Eyebrows that were doing something funny over his eyes at the moment...

Her own eyes narrowed in response to try to figure out what was going -

And that was when she realized she was looking at him up the length of his flat chest. Which meant that wasn't a pillow she was half on.

Almost experimentally, her fingers pulled at the fabric under them the littlest bit.

Yes. Yes, that was definitely Cloud's shirt.

And that was definitely his very solid, nicely warm and comfortable body she was snuggled in against.

... he felt _really_ good to wake up snuggled into...

Her breath dragged into her with a sudden stutter as everything finally came together at the same time in her mind and her eyes went huge. The sound she made wasn't a squeak because Tifa didn't squeak - but it sounded suspiciously like one. Flooded with both the thought of what being so physically familiar with him must make him think of her - as well as how unforgivably she'd invaded his personal space without even asking first - her face flushed bright red and she jerked up and back as fast as she could.

And almost went off the side of the bed backward as a result.

Well, that couldn't possibly have gone over worse.

But there wasn't really any time to think of all the other ways he could've potentially not screwed this one up. Because Tifa was about to topple backward off the edge of the mattress and for some reason his lightning quick reflexes chose only just then to kick back in. Shooting upright alongside her, Cloud reached out to catch her again by the shoulder to drag her back before she could go plummeting to the tacky carpet below.

Not exactly a life or death situation, but Tifa had already suffered embarrassment enough, hadn't she? Cloud certainly wasn't about to judge her for such a simple mistake (especially not one she'd made while totally unconscious), either way, but from the look (and color) on her face, she wasn't so sure of that.

It would definitely be best to just play it off as casually as possible. Yeah.

"...You okay?"

Before she could react to try to keep herself from falling, Cloud was already there, catching her back to safety before she had full registered the threat. Not that falling off the bed was a huge threat but it wouldn't have been a pleasant way to finish waking up. Her fingers curled around his arm instinctively and she made a soft sound. Her cheeks stayed pink though.

She didn't snuggle men. Marlene - yes. And sometimes Aerith or Yuffie in a puppy pile kind of thing for comfort or warmth. And... all right. Maybe Red once or twice when he 'happened' to by lying nearby in the middle of the night and it was cold and a buried Sector Seven was too fresh in her dreams.

But not guys.

Except apparently, now Cloud.

- who _had_ been warm and nice to snuggle against...

"Yeah. Thanks."

The best thing to do was be casual and hope he didn't think snuggling nearby men in her sleep was something she did regularly. Self-conscious, she smoothed down her hair - and then had to smile, albeit, a bit hesitantly at him. Light, she reached out and touched his chin. Speaking of snuggling guys...

"It's good to see you back. Though the desk clerk is going to be disappointed if he's still on shift."

Those would've been some pretty lofty assumptions, but luckily Cloud wasn't all that adept at jumping to totally ridiculous conclusions. (Sure, he had his moments, but...) He was more concerned with her taking away the wrong idea about him, as it was, and not with wondering whether or not she tended to cling to just anybody, in her sleep. Yesterday had been a mess, and they'd both had to let down their guard more than either of them might've been strictly comfortable with. He wouldn't accuse her of vulnerability, but maybe there had been something like it...

But then she smiled again, and he was pretty sure things were going to be okay. That was, at least until she mentioned-

(_Oh crap._)

A self-conscious hand went to the back of his neck as he pulled a face.

"I totally forgot about that guy... No chance you saw a back door out of this place, last night, did you?" A pause. "Though- On the other hand, you really think he's even gonna notice me?"

"We could go out the window?" Maybe... just a little... she was teasing him. But it was okay because that meant they didn't have to focus on being awkward about waking up together and she approved of that. She didn't want -

she didn't want him to be awkward about touching her.

So to emphasize that everything was all right between them, she pressed the tip of a slim finger to the top of his nose and shook her head before letting her hand drop.

Maybe she should tease him about his obliviousness to being a stunning, leggy blond in a short skirt last night... but she couldn't bring herself to do that to him. Instead, she just hummed a thoughtful sound.

"I'm sure his shift is long over by now. And his replacement won't know any better. We can drop off the key and no one will be the wiser."

As further distraction and not entirely for distraction alone either, she added hopefully:_ "_Do you think we could stop and get something warm for breakfast too? ... something with chocolate?"

"Nah, better not go out the window. If anybody saw us, they'd probably think we were trying to skip out on a bill."

And the last thing they needed was more grief, this early in the morning. If the same clerk _was _still on duty, and they both ended up dragged back in through the lobby's front doors... Yeah, no chance.

Sighing, he shook his own head - almost in time with hers - and turned to stretch his legs over the other side of the bed (pretending not to have realized the dorky way he'd crossed his own eyes at her playful poke in the nose).

Now that sounded like a plan: getting out of this inn just as quick as they could and to a decent meal. And then back on the road, of course. With a half-stifled yawn, he dragged his hands back through his hair before looking back over his shoulder again.

"Sure. Whatever you want. I do kind of feel like celebrating, not being... You know... Anymore."

This adorable thing of his was really dangerous. And it kept getting worse the more they traveled together and he forgot to be that careless mercenary she was seeing less and less of. Closer... she was closer to figuring out what was really going on with him...

If the moments of sheer adorkable or knee weakening male didn't kill her first.

"Me too!"

She didn't even try to hold in the grin at that as she scrambled off the bed. Celebrating sounded wonderful, even if it was just with something as blissfully simple as a hot, delicious breakfast together with Cloud that she didn't have to cook herself.

- and this time, if the clerk dropped a pencil, she'd let Cloud lean down and pick it up.


End file.
